by TChris

Borrowing a term that has become popular within the blogosphere, Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-NJ) denounced VP Dick Cheney as "the lead chicken hawk cackling about John Kerry." He used visual aids to illustrate his point.

Lautenberg pointed to a poster with a drawing of a chicken in a military uniform that defined a chicken hawk as "a person enthusiastic about war, provided someone else fights it."

"They shriek like a hawk, but they have the backbone of the chicken," he said.

by TChris

Earlier today, TalkLeft reported that New Hampshire Gov. Craig Benson will probably veto a bill that would eliminate the death penalty for people who were juveniles when the offense was committed. Human Rights Watch sent a letter to Gov. Benson today making a persuasive case for signing the bill. If you live in New Hampshire, you might want to send the Governor a similar letter.

by TChris

People who answer questions in front of Senate Committees often find it difficult to formulate a truthful answer, but one of the biggest whoppers told in recent weeks came from Brett Kavanaugh, who has been nominated for a judgeship on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. Kavanaugh has played a key role in the Bush administration's effort to pack the federal courts with conservative judges. Yet Kavanaugh testified that the White House does not consider the ideology of judicial nominees.

Oh really?

"So can you name five pro-choice judges he has put forward?" Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California, demanded. When Mr. Kavanaugh hesitated, Ms. Feinstein said: "Can you name four? Three? Two, or even one?"

There's no mistake about Kavanaugh's own ideology. As Ken Starr's deputy, Kavanaugh wrote the report to Congress opining that grounds existed to impeach President Clinton.

by TChris

TalkLeft has written (most recently, here and here) about the federalization of crimes that could and should be handled by state and local prosecutors. William Anderson and Candice Jackson write about ill-advised federal prosecutions "that illustrate how federal criminal law has overstepped its proper bounds, prescribing draconian punishments for offenses that should be handled at the state level or that should not be considered crimes at all."

The bottom line in their thoughtful analysis:

During the last century, especially in the last three decades and in the aftermath of the September 11 attacks, Congress has made federal crimes out of an astonishing array of behavior, much of which is already prohibited by state law, could be better addressed with civil penalties, or is considered wrongful not because it violates anyone’s rights but only because Congress says so.

by TChris

Zero tolerance policies are great for public employees, who can follow them while doing zero thinking. Highland Park, Texas has zero tolerance of people who don't pay their traffic tickets -- they all get arrested, no matter how silly the arrest might be.

When [the police] found that 97-year-old Harriette "Dolly" Kelton had an outstanding warrant for failing to pay a traffic ticket, they handcuffed her, put her in the squad car and hauled her to jail.

Dolly's son notes that his mother is a tad forgetful, an understandable infirmity in a person who has nearly reached the century mark. A reasonable officer would have reminded Dolly that she needed to pay the ticket. Instead, the police wasted time and resources taking her into custody and processing her into the jail. The cost in manpower undoubtedly exceeded the amount of the unpaid fine, making this a poor investment for taxpayers, apart from creating a public perception that the Highland Park police are too dim-witted to exercise discretion or common sense.

The Nashville Tenessean reports:

Defense lawyers to huddle

The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers is meeting this week in Nashville to discuss the difficulties of defending clients accused of rape, murder and other heinous crimes.

Attorneys from around the nation will gather at Loews Vanderbilt Hotel for the seminar, ''In Their Defense: Representing the Client Everyone Loves to Hate.''

Criminal defense attorney Mark Geragos, who represents Scott Peterson and has defended actress Winona Ryder and, until recently, pop star Michael Jackson, is scheduled to speak at a luncheon.

The seminar begins tomorrow and runs through Saturday.

The cost of the seminar for nonmembers of NACDL is $520. Attorneys affiliated with state criminal defense lawyer associations of Tennessee, Kentucky, North Carolina, Alabama, Mississippi and Missouri get in for $295. The seminar is free for law students. For more information call 202-872-8600 or log onto www.nacdl.org/meetings.

We'll be there starting tomorrow. If you're a defense lawyer who's never been to an NACDL meeting, we highly recommend it.

Last month, when writing about the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals decision holding that South Carolina's "Choose Life" license plates violated the First Amendment, we opined:

We have a simple solution. Allow "Choose Life" license plates, provided they include the phrase "End the Death Penalty."

We're pleased to report that a growing number of Catholics are beginning to question the support for one, but not the other:

The Florida Senate has passed a bill raising the minimum age for the death penalty to 18. Currently, the state has no minimum.

Capital punishment would be reserved for murderers 18 or older when committing their crime under the bill (SB 224) sponsored by Sen. Victor Crist, R-Tampa. No Florida law regulates how old a criminal must be to receive the death penalty, though the standard in case law is for those 18 and older.

Similar laws have passed in Wyoming and North Dakota. In New Hampshire, the legislature passed the bill but Gov. Craig Benson has said he will veto it.

Unfortunately, there may not be enough time left in Florida's legislative session to get the bill passed by the House and enacted into law. On the other hand, failure to pass it could put Florida's death penalty law for adults in jeopardy:

Driving the measure is a U.S. Supreme Court case that will determine the constitutionality of executing juveniles. If the high court rules against it, Florida's capital punishment laws, which make no separate provisions for minors, would be thrown out.

The bill is sponsored by Sen. Victor Crist, R-Tampa, who has introduced it every year for the past five years.

The Public Integrity Section of the Department of Justice will conduct an investigation of Attorney General John Ashcroft's alleged campaign finance irregularities:

The Justice Department's Public Integrity Section is reviewing allegations that Attorney General John D. Ashcroft may have violated federal campaign finance and disclosure laws based on information developed by the Federal Election Commission. The Public Integrity Section is responsible for determining whether allegations merit investigation as potential criminal violations of campaign finance and disclosure laws and for making recommendations as to whether a special counsel would be needed when a potential conflict of interest with senior Justice officials exists.

At issue is the valuable campaign fundraising list of then-Sen. Ashcroft. He had claimed ownership of the fundraising list during an FEC inquiry, but had not reported it as an asset on his Senate or Justice Department financial disclosure statements.

Jerome at MyDD is covering the Pennsylvania primaries. Republican Senator Arlen Specter has a comfortable lead (52% to 48%) over challenger Toomey with 73% reporting. You can follow the votes here.

Bush backed Specter. In our view, Specter is better than Toomey, but a Democrat would be better than either one:

Specter is in line for the chairmanship of the Judiciary Committee next year _ a prospect that scares conservatives still smarting over his 1987 vote thwarting the Supreme Court nomination of Robert H. Bork.

....Toomey, a three-term lawmaker, is a fiscal conservative, opposes abortion rights and has voted against an increase in the minimum wage and background checks for firearm purchasers at gun shows.

Specter will face Democrat Joe Hoeffel, a Congressman from Philly's suburbs.

Please contribute to Hoeffel here. Here's one reason you should:

American foreign policy should reflect the American ideals of social justice, human rights and personal liberty. And if we must go to war, we must do so with the support of our allies and the United Nations, with a plan to keep our troops safe and a plan to bring our kids home.” - Joe Hoeffel

Atrios sees it one way, Unfair Witness sees it another. The issue: The increasing number of soldiers whose injuries cause permanent brain damage, blindness and paralysis. Heads up: This is one seriously depressing topic.

Atrios:

I really hope Kerry gets out in front of this and proposes massive increases in VA funds. You can have my goddamn tax cut back. I'd rather pay out the money that way and get some quality care for these people than throw it into their change cups a few years from now.

Unfair Witness:

The real solution to this problem is to get those Americans out of Iraq, not to throw money at yet another government program. Besides, if you want the best of care for these broken people why would you send them to a shabby hospital system like the VA anyway? Why throw money at the VA when there are thousands of state of the art hospitals all over the US? Let them go to real doctors at real hospitals, not government facilities which are all run as efficiently as Amtrak. Better yet, bring them home before any more get hurt.

California has declared an emergency at five prisons due to an upsurge in maximum security level prisoners:

California has declared a "state of emergency" in five of its 32 prisons because of an unexpected influx of inmates who have committed serious crimes, officials said on Tuesday. The decision, effective April 1 but only made public in a Los Angeles Times article on Tuesday, allows prison officials to put three inmates into cells usually used by two and suspends other rules for an open-ended but temporary period.

Perhaps if the state incarcerated fewer non-violent felony offenders, they would have more staff and resources available for those who are truly dangerous. The LA Times has more.

Update: Mark Kleiman has more:

Imprisoning people who need to be there is highly cost-effective crime control. But the voters can't repeal the law of diminishing returns. The larger the prison system, the lower the personal crime rate of the marginal prisoner.

Doubling the number of prisoners between 1980 and 1989 was probably a good investment in crime control, even accounting for the suffering of the prisoners and their intimates. Doubling it again between 1989 and today almost certainly wasn't worth it. Continuing to ratchet up the prison headcount as crime rates fall is madness.