Or something like that. The UN has for some time made copies of its resolutions and other information online at un.org, but like a lot of government initiatives the data published is hardly reusable in any meaningful way. URLs are not persistent, and data formats are not open. A small group led by Julian Todd, a "civil hacker" in Liverpool is seeking...
As one of his lead initiatives as Prime Minister, Gordon Brown charged former British attorney general Lord Peter Goldsmith (he of Iraq War justification fame) with undertaking a study of British citizenship. The 134-page report was issued earlier this week (pdf here). Let's just say the early reviews have not been favorable. Two recommendations have been singled...
[This was cross-posted over at Huffington Post] Now I am alone. O what a rogue and peasant slave am I! Is it not monstrous that this player here, But in a fiction, in a dream of passion, Could force his soul so to his own conceit, That from her working all his visage wann'd, Tears in his eyes, distraction in's aspect,...
Somehow, I knew it would come to this. The Ugandan president, Yoweri Museveni, is headed for a confrontation with the international criminal court after saying he will not hand over to The Hague the leaders of his country's rebel Lord's Resistance Army indicted for war crimes. Museveni said Joseph Kony, the LRA leader, and his commanders will instead be brought before...
One of the big legal issues lurking amid the legal war over the war against terrorism is the applicability of U.S. constitutional rights to U.S. government actions overseas. This is an important, and highly unsettled issue under U.S constitutional law. And I am glad to discover that the U.S. is not alone (The full decision can be found here): A...
Democrat Andre Carson won a special congressional election in Indiana yesterday to replace his grandmother, Julia Carson, who died a few months ago. Carson is the second Muslim elected to Congress, following in the footsteps of fellow Democrat Keith Ellison of Minnesota. Interestingly, neither Carson nor Ellison was born Muslim. Ellison was raised Catholic; Carson grew up Baptist. ...
Finally, an answer to the question "Who DOES answer the phone at the White House at 3:00 am?" A funny take on how automatic phone trees can defeat global terrorism. Hat tip: Andrew Sullivan. ...
Now here is a novel argument about "economic torture" from a recent Second Circuit case of Savchuck v. Mukasey: An alien is entitled to protection under CAT when he or she is “more likely than not [to] ...
Slate is publishing a set of dispatches this week about Israel's newest tourism innovation: the "Ultimate Counter-Terrorism Mission," which is "packed full of visits to military bases, security briefings from members of Mossad and Shin Bet, and stops for fine dining." The dispatches are fascinating and well worth reading in themselves, but I was particularly struck by an anecdote...
The remedy for VCCR violations took another interesting twist last month. A state appeals court in Minnesota has addressed the question of the relationship between a VCCR violation and Miranda protections. Interpreting Sanchez-Llamas, the court in State v. Morales-Mulato essentially subsumed VCCR violations within remedies available under Miranda. Here is the key excerpt: Appellant was … arrested and...
Whatever will Fox News do now? Not even the Pentagon still believes that Saddam had operational ties to al Qaeda:An exhaustive review of more than 600,000 Iraqi documents that were captured after the 2003 U.S. invasion has found no evidence that Saddam Hussein's regime had any operational links with Osama bin Laden's al Qaida terrorist network. The Pentagon-sponsored study, scheduled...
The New York Times Magazine has a great story on celebrity philanthropy. The good news is that, as we all know, celebrities can do a tremendous amount of good in promoting important causes. Publicity and access to power guarantees that their sponsorship of causes can make a difference. But the story also highlights just how self-absorbed and...
