The trend towards adopting laws restricting where sex offenders may live may be slowing down as more legal challenges are filed and cities and states are finding they are not the panacea once thought.

From the Kansas Department of Corrections, here are "Twenty Findings of Research on Residential Restrictions for Sex Offenders and the Iowa Experience with Similar Policies."

Just a few:

• Housing restrictions appear to be based largely on three myths that are repeatedly propagated by the media: 1) all sex offenders reoffend; 2) treatment does not work; and 3) the concept of “stranger danger.” Research does not support these myths, but there is research to suggest that such policies may ultimately be counterproductive.

• Research shows that there is no correlation between residency restrictions and reducing sex offenses against children or improving the safety of children.

Florida District Court Judge Marcia Cooke will hold a status conference Monday on the issue of alleged "dirty bomber" Jose Padilla's competency.

From the Southern Distict of Florida Blog, the issues, according to the AP are:

• Reports being suspicious of everyone, including his attorneys, and stated that he does not know who he can and cannot trust. He indicated he was unsure of whether his attorneys might really be federal agents posing as his attorneys.''
  
• Appeared to become visibly distressed whenever asked about sensitive topics (his palms appeared to become sweaty ... his body would tense up, and he would rock back and forth).''
  
  
• Is unable to watch video recordings of his interrogation ..."
  
  
• "Appears convinced at times that no matter what happens he will be returned to the brig, even if he prevails in the current case.''
  
  
• Was certain that nobody could help him, that he could not be rescued from his current situation.''
  
  
• Both experts concluded that Padilla was not faking mental problems and, in Hegarty's words, "is terrified that anyone will consider him mentally ill or crazy.''

In addition to the Afghan detainees released last week, the Pentagon has announced that an additional 33 detainees have been sent back to their home countries. There are 395 detainees still at Guantanamo, only a small fraction of whom have been charged with a crime.

Despite the fact that 16 were sent to Saudi Arabia, the Washington Post says:

State Department officials have been working to reducesignificantly reduce the number of Guantanamo detainees through lengthy negotiations with other countries, although the United States is unwilling to release detainees into the custody of nations where they would likely be abused, tortured or killed.

Hello? Saudi Arabia doesn't torture prisoners?

There's a debate taking shape in Houston. Are the cops disproportionately using stun guns against African-Americans?

[Houston] officers are facing a new question: Are they using the high-voltage Taser -- what police call a less-than-lethal "intermediary" weapon -- indiscriminately against black suspects? The recent arrest and use of a Taser against a black professional football player has once again put the police department of the nation's fourth-largest city under scrutiny.

...Police data show that in almost 1,000 Taser deployments since December 2004, 63 percent of the suspects were black. Houston's population of 1.95 million is 25 percent black.

You do the math.

I was surprised last week to learn uber-publisher Judith Regan had been fired from Harper Collins over the O.J. book fiasco. She brought a ton of money into the company with her (in my view trashy) books. Now it makes more sense:

Rupert Murdoch personally ordered the dismissal of Judith Regan, the publisher of a widely criticized O. J. Simpson book, after he heard reports of a heated conversation Ms. Regan had with a company lawyer on Friday that included comments that were deemed anti-Semitic, according to two people familiar with the News Corporation’s account of the firing.

Mark Jackson, a lawyer with HarperCollins, a division of the News Corporation that includes Ms. Regan’s imprint, reported the alleged comments from a phone conversation with Ms. Regan....

....Mr. Murdoch... authorized [Jane Friedman, HarperCollins’s president and chief executive] to dismiss her, saying her slurs were the final straw after other recent episodes of what were deemed improper behavior, according to one of the people familiar with the News Corporation’s account.

You have until Monday to get two day shipping on the TalkLeft 4th Amendment Subway Tote -- it will arrive by December 22.

TalkLeft's 4th Amendment Subway Tote. (Larger version here.)

Let the 4th Amendment speak for you as you hand your bag over for a search by a subway or airline security guard. It's a silent protest and reminder to authorities that you consider searches without reasonable suspicion or probable cause to be an infringement of your privacy rights.

They make great gifts, especially for college kids. We've sold 13 so far this month.

• Christy at Firedoglake: And Justice Wept

• Perez Hilton blog Takes Their Best Shot: Gossip Blogger sued for $7.6 mil for posting paparazzi photos, fights back. Go Perez!

• Wanna be a judge? There's an opening for U.S. Magistrate Judge in Fort Lauderdale, the Southern District of Florida (Via SD Fla Blog)

• Sentencing Law and Policy on the lethal injection mess.

That ought to get you started. Feel free to add your own favorites.

Priceless.

If none of the others lock it up by Labor Day 2007, Newt Gingrich said today he might enter the Presidential race.

The former House speaker from Georgia said it would not be too late for him to enter the race after next Labor Day, if he believed no candidate had a clear advantage. He praised Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, Sen. John McCain of Arizona and former New York City mayor Rudy Giuliani as the contenders to watch.

''If one of them seals it off by Labor Day, my announcing now wouldn't make any difference anyway,'' Gingrich said. ''If none of the three, having from now 'til Labor Day, can seal it off, the first real vote is in 2008. And there's plenty of time in the age of television and e-mail, between Labor Day and 2008.''

Just what we need, another contract on America. It took us twelve years to work our way out from under the last one.

I don't think he has a prayer. His own personal peccadillos are too well known. Besides, he's too busy working on his current mission, restoring religion to American Government.

Who knows how long Bush's NSA warrantless wiretapping has been going on, but it was a year ago today that Bush 'fessed up to it:

On Dec. 17, 2005, Bush publicly acknowledged for the first time he had authorized the NSA to monitor, without approval from a judge, phone calls and e-mails that come into or originate in the U.S. and involve people the government suspects of having terrorist links.

Bush said he had no intention of halting what he called a "vital tool" in the war on terror.

It's up to the Dems now. Will they have the spine and the wherewithal to put an end to it...without passing more laws that increase the executive's power to order spying on more of us without adequate judicial oversight?

Nobody got named person of the year by Time because they named everybody.

The annual honor for 2006 went to each and every one of us, as Time cited the shift from institutions to individuals citizens of the new digital democracy, as the magazine put it. The winners this year were anyone using or creating content on the World Wide Web.

"If you choose an individual, you have to justify how that person affected millions of people," said Richard Stengel, who took over as Time's managing editor earlier this year. "But if you choose millions of people, you don't have to justify it to anyone."

It's really not us, of course, it's the web. But I guess saying it's us personalizes it a bit.

The Washington Post goes on for five pages about whether Bill Clinton will be a plus or a minus for Hillary's presidential campaign.

Not much news here. Shorter version: He's both. Must be a slow news day. It sure shouldn't have taken five pages to point that out, especially when neither Bill nor Hillary were interviewed for the piece.

My view: Bottom line: He's a huge asset. He's a political dynamo and a statesman. She's smart and a hard worker. She's held her own as Senator, she'd do the same as President. It'd be nice to have him back in the White House, even as First Spouse.