Here is a survey that will strike fear in the heart of Tom Friedman. According to a survey released yesterday by Pew Research, Americans put far too little pressure on their kids to do well in school, particularly in comparison to their counterparts in Asia. "Have American parents become too pushy about their kids' education? Many experts seem...
The BBC reports that delegates in New York appear to be close to an agreement on a Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. This new, potentially expansive human rights treaty, will be submitted to the U.N. General Assembly this September and then opened for signatures and ratifications in the fall. I don't have any views on the...
The Jerusalem Post published a short piece of mine about Human Rights Watch and its accusations of Israeli war crimes in the recent Lebanon war. The two second version of the piece: Human Rights Watch accused Israel of the war crime of indiscriminate bombing in the Lebanese village of Srifa, where, according to Human Rights Watch, Israel killed forty-something...
Just in case you didn't get enough commentary here and elsewhere on Judge Taylor's decision last week invalidating the NSA wiretapping program, Luke Debevec has this useful roundup of blogosphere reaction in today's Legal Intelligencer. Luke, an attorney in Philadelphia, also has a posting on his blog here. Check it out! ...
As the NYT reports, Amnesty International issued a blistering ...
Starting Monday of next week, Opinio Juris is pleased to be hosting an online preview of a roundtable at the annual meeting of the American Political Science Association. Entitled "The Allocation of Normative Power to and among International Tribunals," the roundtable will explore legal and political issues arising out of the rise of international tribunals and the increasing legalization...
I have a tendency to be skeptical about reports regarding how bad (or good) things are going in Iraq. It is one of those subjects where it seems the messenger's bias often influences the outcome of the message. For example, the Washington Post reported in October 2004 that "at least 100,000 Iraqi civilians may have died because of...
If you go to the New York Times homepage today there is a large advertisement for the CNN documentary on Osama Bin Laden scheduled tonight at 9 p.m. EST. Should be interesting. But the review of the documentary in the Times is less than flattering. My favorite line is "[w]ith the heavy rotation of soulful portraits of the soft-voiced...
Given how interesting the discussion about Roger's post about Ann Althouse and Judge Taylor's decision in the NSA case have been, I think it's worth opening up the discussion to readers who don't necessarily read beyond the comments. The basic question is this: When is a judicial decision an abuse of power? At a minimum, I think, a judicial decision...
For those that are interested, my short essay on whether Saddam is likely to be executed before a verdict is reached in the current Anfal trial is now available at The Grotian Moment. ...
In what is being billed as the first agreement of its kind, the LRA has pledged to protect rare wildlife in a remote park it occupies in eastern Congo, including rare pygmy giraffe and what are thought to be the last four northern white rhinos in the wild: In an apparent bid to burnish their brutal reputation, the Lord's Resistance Army...
This is a landmark month in the history of international law: with the accession of the Republic of Montenegro on August 2, the 1949 Geneva Conventions have become the first international treaty in modern history to achieve universal acceptance. Montenegro also acceded to the two 1977 Additional Protocols, bringing the number of States party to Additional Protocol I to...
