LNILR wrote yesterday of Michael Hayden's lack of understanding of the Fourth Amendment.

I agree. I have previously written about his role in the failed Operation Trailblazer program and his endorsement of Bush's warrantless NSA electronic surviellance program. Hayden was in charge of the NSA when Bush's program went into effect and was called upon by Bush to be a spokesman supporting it.

It's the e-mails, as Jason Leopold reported previously and reports again today. Those 250 pages of documents that Patrick Fitzgerald told Team Libby about in his January 23 letter (pdf) and turned over to the Libby defense team in February. I thought the e-mails were all from the Office of the Vice President, but Jason reports they are also from the Office of the President, and a review of Fitz's letter (page 7) shows this to be the case.

In February, TruthOut was the first to report the existence of the 250 pages of emails from Vice President Dick Cheney's office and the Office of the President that were written in mid-2003.

Some of the emails and memos were written by Rove, and are part of a growing body of evidence suggesting he lied to the grand jury and the FBI and may have obstructed justice during the course of the investigation. It was following their disclosure that Fitzgerald advised Rove's attorney, Robert Luskin, several weeks ago that he intends to indict Rove for perjury and lying to investigators. The lingering question, sources close to the case said, is whether Fitzgerald will add obstruction of justice to the list of charges that he has already drafted against Rove.

Sure, the Matt Cooper - Karl Rove conversation and Hadley e-mail is also an issue, one that likely will lead to a false statements and/or perjury charge for Rove. But Rove's failure to disclose these other communications is what reportedly has Fitz considering an obstruction of justice charge. Particularly e-mails between Rove and Andrew Card.

Students for Sensible Drug Policy alerts us to this disgusting case of prisoner abuse in Rhode Island:

Three state correctional officers, including a captain who allegedly forced an inmate to taste his own feces on Valentine's Day, were arrested and charged yesterday with multiple counts of assaulting five inmates in the Adult Correctional Institutions.

The arrests were the result of a three-month investigation launched by authorities after prison officials learned about the feces incident involving inmate Michael Walsh, 30, of East Providence. State police Maj. Steven G. O'Donnell said that other inmates came forward with allegations that they suffered physical abuse at the hands of correctional officers. State police detectives interviewed those inmates and were able to corroborate the allegations that resulted in yesterday's charges.

The inmates "were serving short sentences for crimes such as felony shoplifting and drug possession."

by TChris

Marilyn Hubbard thinks the people responsible for her husband's death in the Moss Point jail are being protected. The jailers say Jesse Hubbard hung himself with his T-shirt. Marilyn doesn't believe that her husband, arrested for public intoxication and disorderly conduct, had any reason to kill himself.

An investigation organized by the Moss Point-Jackson County, Mississippi chapter of the NAACP is shedding new light on Jesse's death.

Benjamin L. Crump, the Hubbard's lawyer, announced the findings with conviction.

"Truth will lead us to justice," he said. "The pathology findings are that it is very unlikely that Mr. Hubbard died from hanging. The medical reports indicate bruising that is inconsistent with hanging."

by TChris

As TalkLeft noted here, Patrick Kennedy is taking responsibility for his addiction:

Kennedy said he's been trying for months to kick a narcotic painkiller which he declined to name. He also told the newspaper he has "never gotten over" the chronic back pain and painkiller abuse that stemmed from surgery to remove a growth near his spine during college.

Rush Limbaugh's recent brush with the criminal justice system proves that drug abuse doesn't depend on political philosophy. The Boston Herald reports that 2 million Americans abuse prescription narcotics.

by TChris

Another poll, another reason for the president to think about spending the summer at his ranch, clearing brush.

"This administration may be over," Lance Tarrance, a chief architect of the Republicans' 1960s and '70s Southern strategy, told a gathering of journalists and political wonks last week. "By and large, if you want to be tough about it, the relevancy of this administration on policy may be over."

A new poll by RT Strategies, the firm headed by Tarrance and Democratic pollster Thomas Riehle, shows that 59 percent of Americans disapprove of Bush's job performance, while 36 percent approve -- a finding in line with other recent polls.

Other fun polling results:

by TChris

The administration complains that news reports from Iraq enhance the negative and omit the positive. What "positive" event could be more newsworthy than this?

More Iraqi civilians were killed in Baghdad during the first three months of this year than at any time since the toppling of Saddam Hussein's regime -- at least 3,800, most of them found hog-tied and shot execution-style.

Others were strangled, electrocuted, stabbed, garroted or hanged. Some died in bombings. Many bore signs of torture such as bruises, drill holes, burn marks, gouged eyes or severed limbs.

by TChris

First they attacked Roe v. Wade, now they're going after Griswold v. Connecticut. The next culture war (as if we need another one) will be waged over contraception, according to this article in the NY Times Magazine.

"We see a direct connection between the practice of contraception and the practice of abortion," says Judie Brown, president of the American Life League, an organization that has battled abortion for 27 years but that, like others, now has a larger mission. "The mind-set that invites a couple to use contraception is an antichild mind-set," she told me. "So when a baby is conceived accidentally, the couple already have this negative attitude toward the child. Therefore seeking an abortion is a natural outcome. We oppose all forms of contraception."

Contraception prevents abortion, an obvious reality that doesn't deter this crowd from arguing that sex without procreative intent is "anti-child." Sex without procreative intent is fun, and it seems a hard sell to convince people otherwise. The article informs us that a growing number of evangelicals are trying to do just that.

by Last Night in Little Rock

From Crooks and Liars is a video clip, posted today and reprised from January from Keith Olberman's Countdown on MSNBC where a General with the NSA doesn't even know what the Fourth Amendment says. And to think that these bozos are determining what is right or wrong when the NSA decides to seize our communications.

Read the transcript on Crooks and Liars or Countdown. It is pathetic. Olberman's final observation:

by TChris

For the reasons TalkLeft discussed here and here and here and here and in many other posts, the Real ID Act is a bad law. TalkLeft's take:

This is a quick fix that won't do anything to stop terrorists or enhance our safety. It will only further diminish our privacy rights. Can anyone say, "Your Papers Please?"

As TalkLeft predicted here, states are starting to balk at implementing the law.

They say the law -- which requires states to use sources like birth certificates and national immigration databases to verify that people applying for or renewing driver's licenses are American citizens or legal residents -- will be too expensive and difficult to put in place by the May 2008 deadline. Another issue is the privacy impact of the requirement that states share, through databases, the personal information needed for a driver's license.

The Earl Washington case stands out in my mind as one of the most egregious wrongful conviction cases. Washington is retarded, and his confession to rape and murder consisted of details supplied by the interrogating officer. While ultimately DNA cleared Washington of involvement in the rape and murder, as Richard Cohen pointed out in this 2001 Washington Post article, the case is less about how he was saved by DNA than how he was almost murdered by police.

Yesterday, a jury awarded Washington $2.25 million in damages from the interrogating cop's estate, finding he had fabricated Washington's confession.

Earl Washington Jr., who came within nine days of being executed, had sued the estate of the state police investigator, Curtis Reese Wilmore, who died in 1994. Jurors awarded Washington damages upon finding that Wilmore deliberately fabricated evidence that led to his conviction and death sentence.

How popular is Ambien? I took this photo at baggage claim last year while picking up the TL kid. It was a large indoor billboard right by the carousels. More on that here.

The Washington Post has a funny article about Ambien users today.

After all these beautiful nights together, according to recent news reports, the Ambien zombies are arising against their will to gorge themselves at the fridge, or take the wheel, or do something illegal. It wasn't me, officer; it was Ambien.

...We are lagged-out, pajama-wearing drifters -- lost in the gap between slumber and wakey-wakey, even though Ambien's manufacturer, Sanofi-Aventis, implores users to follow the directions, as always: Take the drug only when you're on your way to (or already in) bed, and only when you have seven or eight uninterrupted hours to devote to sleep; don't take it with booze; make sure your doctor knows if you're taking anything else. Which is good advice, but is often met with "blah blah blah."