by TChris

Documents suggest that New York City Mayor Bloomberg lied when he denied that politics played any part in his decision to deny protesters access to the Great Lawn in Central Park during the 2004 Republican Convention. The Bloomberg administration claimed to be "motivated by a concern for the condition of the expensively renovated Great Lawn or by law enforcement's ability to secure the crowd," even though documents produced in a lawsuit show that the police preferred to have protestors gathered together in that location.

Those documents ... suggest that officials were indeed motivated by political concerns over how the protests would play out while the Republican delegates were in town, and how the events could affect the mayor's re-election campaign the following year. ...

[T]he documents, which are part of the lawsuit brought by the National Council of Arab Americans and the Answer Coalition, an antiwar civil rights group, indicate that politics and appearances were at the center of the administration's strategy and that Mr. Bloomberg was more intimately involved in the discussions over demonstrations in the park than he said.

by TChris

Colorado permits felons to vote after they finish serving a sentence. Because parole did not exist when the Colorado Constitution was enacted, the ACLU argued that a sentence ends (for voting purposes) when a felon is released from prison on parole. In a decision released today, the Colorado Supreme Court disagreed.

''Of course we agree with Danielson that parole did not exist at the time Colorado adopted its constitution, but this does not mean that the General Assembly was constrained from punishing crimes with sentences that include custody while the convicted person is being transitioned to community and before restoration of his or her full rights,'' the ruling said.

by TChris

Some people think that prisoners deserve any evil that befalls them during incarceration. Some don't think about prisoners at all -- out of sight, out of mind. But prison violence should concern everyone, because most prisoners will eventually be released, and years of victimization can destroy an inmate's ability to begin a law-abiding, productive life. Worse, it can turn a casual criminal into a vicious predator. That's why society should pay attention to prison rape.

"It's a real and serious problem," said Malcolm Feeley, professor of law at the University of California, Berkeley. "It may be the single largest shame of the American criminal justice system, and that's saying a lot."

The problem of prison rape is exacerbated by laws that treat juvenile offenders as adults, setting up vulnerable young men as prey for violent inmates.

If you thought Guantanamo was likely to close soon, think again. Camp 6, a permanent prison, is set to open in September.

....Camp 6, a state-of-the-art maximum-security jail built by a Halliburton subsidiary, will be able to hold 200 prisoners. Commander Robert Durand, a spokesman for Joint Task Force Guantanamo, said the $30m, two-storey block was due to open at the end of September. He added: "Camp 6 is designed to improve the quality of life for the detainees and provide greater protection for the people working in the facility."

Amnesty International responds:

[Restored from another computer]

Mel Gibson has issued an apology of sorts. He acknowledges he said "despicable" things to a Sheriff's deputy and that he has been battling alcoholism all his life. [Background here and here.]

An investigation is underway in L.A. to determine whether he received preferential treatment by not including his allegedly anti-semitic comments in the first official report released to the media. The Sheriff's office says:

"There is no cover-up," [Sheriff Lee Baca] said. "Our job is not to [focus] on what he said. It's to establish his blood-alcohol level when he was driving and proceed with the case.

But Gibson has donated in the past to a charity spearheaded by Baca and provided other support to the Sheriff's department:

He served in 2002 as a "celebrity representative" for the L.A. Sheriff's Department's Star Organization, a group that provides scholarships and aid for the
children of slain sheriff's deputies. Gibson donated $10,000 to the stepdaughter of
a deputy shot and killed in the line of duty and filmed public service announcements for Baca's relief committee dressed in a sheriff's uniform.

From Gibson's statement:

[Recreated from another computer]

The New York Times today endorsed Ned Lamont. The Hartford Courant endorsed Lieberman.

The papers agree on one thing: Lieberman's stance on Iraq has put him in this mess. While other Democrats also voted for the Iraq War, most have come around since by calling for withdrawal of our troops at the earliest opportunity, whether by a timetable or not. As the latest Gallup poll points out, this is the wish of most Americans...in fact, as many Americans now want us out of Iraq as wanted us out of Vietnam in 1969. Lieberman, though, has refused to acknowledge this. He stubbornly clings to the Bush agenda on the war.

Even the Courant has good things to say about Ned Lamont. The major negative is his "relative inexperience." I'll take a pol with bright ideas, high ideals, enthusiasm and vision any day over an entrenched pol who thinks by virtue of his longevity he owns the seat.

[Restored from Google Cache]

If Mel Gibson doesn't become a pariah, I'll be amazed. On the one hand, there have been reports for years that the actor and creator of Passion of the Christ is anti-semitic. On the other, if the following police report is accurate, now there's evidence of it straight from his own mouth.

TMZ has obtained the unredacted copy (pdf) of Gibson's DUI arrest report, handwritten by the officer.

Once inside the car, ....the report says Gibson told the deputy, "You mother f****r. I'm going to f*** you." The report also says "Gibson almost continually [sic] threatened me saying he 'owns Malibu' and will spend all of his money to 'get even' with me."

The report says Gibson then launched into a barrage of anti-Semitic statements: "F*****g Jews... The Jews are responsible for all the wars in the world." Gibson then asked the deputy, "Are you a Jew?"

I may never watch Tequilla Sunrise again.

[Restored from Google Cache]

(by TChris)

More deception from the Bush administration:

The State Department agency in charge of $1.4 billion in reconstruction money bq. In Iraq used an accounting shell game to hide ballooning cost overruns on its projects there and knowingly withheld information on schedule delays from Congress, a federal audit released late Friday has found.

"Released late Friday" for obvious reasons. Let's hope the networks still view government fraud as newsworthy come Monday.

One of the contractors responsible the cost overruns is well connected to the Bush administration: Bechtel.

[Reconstructed from Google Cache]

Here comes NATO.

NATO's expansion into southern Afghanistan will target drug warlords who are the root cause of growing violence, the force's commander said on Saturday.

NATO will embark on the biggest mission in its history on Monday when it takes over security from the U.S.-led coalition in six southern provinces, extending its authority to almost all of the country.

Related: In the "picture that speaks 1,000 category":

An Afghan girl holds her brother as they take a break from searching for items to recycle in Kabul July 29, 2006. REUTERS/Ahmad Masood, larger version here.

[Reconstructed from Google Cache]

Crooks and Liars has the video of David Letterman's spoof last night on the Hardball diatribe of the she-pundit with long blond hair in which she postulates that Bill Clinton has latent homosexual tendencies.

In case you're not familiar with the story behind it, Media Matters has the details.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice is now in Israel where she will attempt to sell Bush's new peace plan. From Reuters:

U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice arrived in Jerusalem on Saturday for talks on ending the war in Lebanon as Israel signaled it would not demand the immediate disarming of Hizbollah as part of any deal. Accusing Rice of serving only Israel's interests, Hizbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah vowed more attacks on Israel's cities if it did not end an offensive launched after the guerrilla group captured two soldiers in a raid on July 12.

Israel rejected as unnecessary a United Nations plea for a three-day truce to aid civilians trapped by fighting as its forces pulled out of the Lebanese border town of Bint Jbeil, scene of fierce fighting in recent days.

[Reconstructed from Google Cache]

President Bush has submitted a new plan for detaining terror suspects under which U.S. citizens suspected of terror ties might be detained indefinitely and barred from access to civilian courts.

According to the draft, the military would be allowed to detain all "enemy combatants" until hostilities cease. The bill defines enemy combatants as anyone "engaged in hostilities against the United States or its coalition partners who has committed an act that violates the law of war and this statute."

Legal experts said Friday that such language is dangerously broad and could authorize the military to detain indefinitely U.S. citizens who had only tenuous ties to terror networks like al Qaeda.

Drug War Rant connects the dots.