This is right out of the Twilight Zone--Newsweek reports on Air CIA which flew ghost detainees on a 737 to parts unknown, often and interrogating them for months.

We wrote about this here, the Washington Post covered it here, but Newsweek has a lot more detail - and proof: [link via Cursor.]

NEWSWEEK has obtained previously unpublished flight plans indicating the agency has been operating a Boeing 737 as part of a top-secret global charter servicing clandestine interrogation facilities used in the war on terror.

Read the story of Khaled el-Masri - he was gone for 5 months.

Hunter Thompson's post-death wishes were that he be cremated, and that his ashes then be blown out of a cannon across his ranch. His entertainment lawyer from Boston, George Tobia, Jr, says that will be done. Tobia also provides this description of Hunter's death:

In a phone interview yesterday, Tobia said only in retrospect does it makes sense that the 67-year-old author sat in his kitchen Sunday afternoon, stuck a .45-caliber handgun in his mouth, and killed himself while his wife listened on the phone and his son and daughter-in-law were in another room of his house. His wife had no idea what had happened until she returned home later.

The Denver Post says Hunter's son Juan Thompson provided this account to investigators:

The right thinks this is the way to get support for Bush's plan to privatize social security accounts:

[ad removed now that TRO has been granted against USA Next]

It's an ad running on the American Spectator website (column on the right as of now). It clicks through to USA Next. Yes, the lobbying group that brought us Swift Boat Vets. They will spend $10 mil to attack the AARP.

For the truth: There is No Crisis.

[Via Steve Gilliard and Atrios.]

by TChris

Ed Stoss and his lawyer are both in trouble with the law. Stoss was given a 30 day sentence because the City of Roseville, Michigan doesn't appreciate the mural he painted on the outside of his studio.

Stross, whose mural is a take on Michelangelo's "Creation of Man", depicts Eve with bare breasts and has the word "love" written on it. City officials say they gave the 43-year-old artist permission to paint on the wall but explicitly told him he couldn't use letters or paint genitalia. ... In sentencing Stross on Thursday, Judge Marco Santia also put Stross on probation and ordered him to pay a fine and cover up the breasts and the word "love."

The punishment seems ridiculous for an artist who is only exercising his freedom of artistic expression (and who wishes to express a concept as inoffensive as love), a point that his new lawyer, Carl Marlinga, hopes to make. Marlinga also hopes to persuade the court that breasts are not, in fact, genitalia.

Unfortunately, Marlinga, a former county prosecutor, has problems of his own: he's facing a federal criminal prosecution for campaign finance violations, charges that were brought against him before he entered private practice.

by TChris

This is the kind of crime story that makes men cringe.

An Alaska woman is in jail, accused of cutting off her boyfriend’s penis and flushing it down a toilet. Police say Kim Tran did it after her boyfriend tried to break up with her.

Holy Lorena Bobbitt, Batman!

At least Tran was kind enough to untie her boyfriend and drive him to the hospital after doing the deed. Then she drove home, where police found her cleaning the bathroom.

Tran is charged with first-degree assault, domestic violence and tampering with evidence.

In July, 1990, Hunter Thompson wrote this (excerpted) letter of appreciation to Keith Stroup, former executive director of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, for inclusion in the magazine's publication, The Champion. It also appears on page 310, “Songs of the Doomed, More Notes on the Death of the American Dream, Gonzo Papers Vol. 3” (1990) by Summit Books.

Woody Creek, July 1990:

Ho-ho. These lame cheapjack bullies had reckoned without the Long Riders from NACDL, who came over the horizon on both flanks and swept down on them like Jeb Stuart at the first Battle of Bull Run, and I will never forget the feeling of wild happiness and raw courage I felt when I saw them coming and knew that I finally had not just the troops, but Generals . . . and, Mother of Babbling Christ, I even had credit.

by TChris

We're all familiar with classified facts and secret warrants, but should there be such a thing as secret legal arguments? The Justice Department thinks so, but the Washington Post argues for transparency in the government's interaction with the legal system.

The question arises from the case of Ahmed Abu Ali, who was arrested in Saudi Arabia. Ali's family believes the United States engineered Ali's arrest and continuing detention. The family brought a lawsuit in federal district court, and the Justice Department moved to dismiss the suit -- but doesn't want to make its reasons public, or even share its theory with the lawyers representing Ali's family.

It has proposed adding to the facts at Judge Bates's disposal by submitting secret evidence that Mr. Abu Ali's attorneys would have no opportunity to challenge. Most recently, it urged that the case be dismissed on the basis, yet again, of secret evidence -- this time supplemented with what a Justice Department lawyer termed "legal argument [that] itself cannot be made public without disclosing the classified information that underlies it."

If lawyers fighting for Ali's freedom had access to the "secret evidence," they might be able to refute it. And if they knew the government's "secret arguments," they might be able to convince the judge that the arguments lacks merit. But if everything is kept secret, neither Ali's lawyers nor the public can act as a check against the administration's lawless behavior. The adversarial system of justice cannot function in Ali's case if the Justice Department gets its way.

In this case, the liberty of a U.S. citizen is at stake. ... What is clear is that Mr. Abu Ali has been held for 20 months without being charged and that, as Judge Bates wrote in December, his lawyers "have presented some unrebutted evidence that [his] detention is at the behest and ongoing direction of United States officials." It should be unthinkable that the courts would resolve this matter without hearing from both sides on key legal questions. It should have been unthinkable for the government to propose such a step.

The reminiscences and flashbacks for Hunter Thompson are flying around the web. Here are some sites, some articles, and some clips:

• HST on Conan O'Brian

Conan: "You keep barrels of GUNPOWDER in your basement? What on earth for?"

HST: "Well, uh, em, to make bombs of course."

Conan: "You make bombs???"

HST (startled, looks around): "BOMBS??!! WHERE ??"

Aspen Daily News: Caption to the photo of Hunter at an anti-war rally at Aspen's Paepcke Park in 2003:

He told the crowd, "This president has destroyed the country, the economy, the relationship with the rest of the world. He's a monster in the White House. He should resign."

More:

• Excellent tribute page with lengthy quotes from Hunter's writing at Marc Cooper's place.

• San Antonio/Aspen Lawyer Gerry Goldstein:

Hunter was not only a national treasure, but the conscience of this little village," said Gerry Goldstein, a prominent Aspen attorney who is a dear friend of the Thompson family. "He kept us all honest. It didn't matter who you were, whether you were his friend or someone he didn't even know. He didn't mind grading your paper. He was righteous. He was part of a literary nobility."

• Jeff Goldstein at Protein Wisdom has this great photo:

Journalist Hunter Thompson fatally shot himself tonight. Aspen Sheriff Bob Braudis, a close friend of Hunter's, has confirmed the sad news. He was found by his son, Juan Thompson. Family Spokesman Troy Hooper told the LA Times that "Thompson had been in pain from back surgery and an artificial hip. And he had broken his leg on a recent trip to Hawaii." The Denver Post and the New York Times have more.

Here is Hunter's latest Hey Rube column, dated February 15, 2005. It ends with this line:

So long and Mahalo.

Update: I've decided to write a few lines about the last two times I saw Hunter. One was five or so years ago at Thansgiving in Aspen, at the home of his very good friends Gerry and Chris Goldstein. It was a small dinner, as compared to the huge party that would follow later in the evening. At dinner were Gerry and Chris, Hunter, 60 Minutes' Ed Bradley with one of his daughters and New York lawyer Jerry Lefcourt. No, there weren't any drugs at dinner, but what we all talked about afterwards was how Hunter had been the most lucid person at the table that night. In fact, he was downright eloquent.

Update: Mr. Hindraker has acknowledged writing the e-mail and apologized for it. I think his apology is genuine and I consider the matter closed. I am also going to send him an e-mail complimenting him on his swift and direct response, and I've updated the title to this post. Everyone has clicked the "send" button a little too fast at one time or another. One of the things I have always liked about AOL is that it has an "unsend" button where you can unsend your mail if it was directed to another AOL user. I've used it many times.

******************
Too funny...Powerline Blog is an uber-right blog by three lawyers. Time Magazine named it Blog of the Year, primarily for its coverage of the Dan Rather story. One of the authors is lawyer John Hindraker who blogs under the name Hindrocket. He went to Harvard Law School. You can sometimes see him punditing on cable news talk shows. Here's how he writes on Powerline. Want to know how he really talks when he thinks no one is listening except a liberal?

Check out this e-mail response Hindraker sent a blogger for Minnesota Politics, in response to an email which expressed a difference of opinion on the Jeff Gannon story, but had no profanity or name-calling.

Nice. I have no doubt that Mr. Hindraker is an intelligent man with a high IQ. All the more reason for him to use it. Time Magazine should be cringing right now along with the rest of us. [link via TBogg who has more.]

Update: MN Politics responds in the comments here that the e-mail he received was from "John H." at Powerline. Here is the copy of the heading from the email, which he just e-mailed me (I've substituted xxx for the IP addresses since I don't think they should be public):

Can someone explain why this ad is so offensive it would be pulled in Milan?

'A tribute to women' ... The Last Supper advertisement for Marithé and François Girbaud

The Guardian reports:

The poster, by French fashion house Marithé and François Gribaud, is a version of Leonardo da Vinci's work with an almost all-female cast. Angelic-looking women clad in the company's "casual chic" pose around a long table as Christ and his apostles. One man, John the Apostle, sits on a woman's lap, his torso bare and jeans riding low.

The poster has been plastered on walls, billboards and magazines in New York and Paris for weeks. In Milan, where Leonardo's fresco is preserved and the influence of the Vatican is never far away, city authorities have banned it.

It's a play off the best-selling book, the DaVinci Code, "which suggests that the figure of John in Da Vinci's masterpiece is actually Mary Magdalen in disguise."

Not surprisingly, the capture of recently released sex offender and accused Denver rapist Brent J. Brents is sparking protests over the release of sex offenders. But those who are claiming sex offenders can't be treated are wrong. Treatment while in prison dramatically reduces the risk of recidivism.

A 2003 Corrections Department report evaluating the treatment of sex offenders.... found three of every four sex offenders who received no therapy reoffended, compared with one in every six for those who completed the first phase of treatment. The rate improved to one in 10 for those who finished the second phase in a minimum-security facility for sex offenders. The study examined the records of 3,338 sex offenders.

The report also states that "current Parole Board members are extremely reluctant to release sex offenders who refuse to participate in treatment."

So hold the cries for longer sentences and instead demand that sex offenders be given treatment while in prison. For those that refuse treatment, parole boards likely will keep them in jail. Many states allow for civil commitment of sex offenders after their prison terms are up.

Treatment works. States should make it mandatory. With more and more states, including Colorado, setting life in prison as the top end of the sentencing range for sex offenders, parole boards have the option of keeping the most dangerous offenders in prison while allowing those who have become rehabilitated to re-enter society.