Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA) has agreed to sponsor a federal bill, LERA, that would substantially increase good time for federal prisoners. His office sent out this progress report today, which we received from the Federal Prison Policy Project with permission to reprint:

Mr. Scott has agreed to develop and introduce a bill based on the concepts in what is referred to as LERA (Literacy, Education and Rehabilitation Act). This bill would establish a good conduct credit system in the federal prison system which would provide for credit classifications of 15 days for every 30 days served for exemplary performance, 10 for 30 for satisfactory performance, 5 for 30 for marginal performance in programs or work assignments, with no credits while in disciplinary or segregation status. Sentences would be reduced by the number of credit days accumulated.

The bill is currently being drafted by the office that does legislative drafts for the Congress and we are likely to have a draft completed by the second week in December. Sometime around the first of the year, the bill will be circulated to House Member offices to offer them an opportunity to cosponsor it. The bill will likely be filed sometime in late January or early February after Members return for the 2nd Session of this Congress.

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A Colorado judge has ordered the return of marijuana, paraphernalia and a grow light to a medical marijuana patient. The items were seized during a search by a federal-state drug task force and criminal charges were dismissed. The defendant filed for the return of the seized property, and following a hearing yesterday, the Judge ruled in his favor:

Under a Colorado law that voters approved in 2000, people suffering from debilitating medical conditions, such as cancer, HIV/AIDS, glaucoma, and chronic severe pain, are allowed to grow and smoke marijuana. Colorado is one of eight states that allows medicinal marijuana use. Nord, who has battled kidney cancer, diabetes, a lung disease, and other illnesses, is listed with the state's Medical Marijuana Registry program.

But according to federal laws, none of that matters; marijuana is an illegal drug for everyone.

Democratic presidential candidate Wesley Clark said today in New Hampshire that he has not ruled out Hillary Clinton as a VP candidate.

We don't think it will happen. Hillary has repeatedly said she will serve out her six year Senate term.

Meanwhile, Clark has picked up an endorsement from Kris Kristofferson, who sent the campaign an e-mail saying:

"Just when the world is being dragged into the death spiral of an unending cycle of violence by a vision-less, coldblooded collection of think-tank warriors goose-stepping their way into the new millennium with a stunning lack of respect for human rights, the environment, or international law, along comes a man with the proven credentials of intelligence, integrity, and courage singularly equipped by his spirit and experience to lead us out of this mess. Don't listen to what the lying liars say about him; listen to what he says. Wesley Clark is a prayer answered."

Former Illinois Senator Paul Simon has died. He was 75.

Sen. Simon went into the hospital Thursday for a single bypass operation and died yesterday after the surgery. Right before he went into the hospital, he had been scheduled to endorse Howard Dean. Due to shortness of breath, he couldn't make the appearance and instead went into the hospital. Once there he called reporters and made the endorsement from his hospital bed.

Sen. Simon was a long-time death penalty opponent and served as Co-chair of the Illinois commission appointed by Gov. George Ryan to look into the state's capital punishment system.

Simon... said that the commission is likely to be unable to give Gov. Ryan an "iron-clad guarantee" that, even with extensive legal reforms, no innocent person would be convicted of a capital crime. He has said that it is possible that the commission will conclude that there is no way to salvage the death penalty.

R.I.P.

Update: Drug War Rant has a long quote from a 1996 article Sen. Simon co-wrote with Dave Koppel for National Law Journal on the Drug War. Here's a snippet, but go over and read the whole thing:

A grand jury in Rhode Island has completed its investigation into last February's night club fire in which 100 people died as a result of pyrotechnics used by a band during a show. Indictments charging involuntary manslaughter were returned against the owners of the nightclub and the band's tour manager.

This just in via email from the National Coaliton to Abolish the Death Penalty (NCADP):

A Pennsylvania man today became the 112th person to be freed from death row because of factual innocence after prosecutors announced they are dropping charges against him.

Nicholas James Yarris, 41, has spent 21 years on death row for a crime he did not commit. He is Pennsylvania's fifth exoneree and the 10th of this year. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, the ten people who have been freed from death row due to actual innocence in 2003 ties a record set in 1987, when ten people also were exonerated.

"The death penalty in America is not merely flawed; it is broken and beyond repair," said Brian Roberts, executive director of the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. "For every eight people that have been executed in this country during the past three decades, one person has been found to be actually innocent. The 112 people found to be innocent were not released due to what some might call a legal technicality - flawed jury instruction, for example - but because they actually did not do the crime."

In other death penalty news, on his last day in office, Kentucky Governor Paul Patton commuted the death penalty sentence of Kevin Stanford who was 17 at the time of his crime.

Update: Nicholas Yarris' attorney and frequent TalkLeft commenter Peter Goldberger, has represented Mr. Yarris in his bid for freedom for the past ten years. He sends in this link, and adds, "Neither the DA nor the judge offered even a kind word, much less an apology to Nick."

Smoking Gun has a confidential Los Angeles Department of Children & Family Services memorandum detailing the Los Angeles child welfare agency's February 2003 investigation into sexual abuse allegations against Michael Jackson by the cancer-stricken accuser who is now the purported victim in the forthcoming criminal case. The report concludes the charges are unfounded. Details here.

A confidential investigation by Los Angeles police and child welfare officials concluded earlier this year that allegations Michael Jackson sexually abused a cancer-stricken boy were "unfounded," according to an internal government memo obtained by The Smoking Gun.

The probe's findings were based, in large part, on interviews with the alleged victim, his two siblings, and the boy's mother. According to the memo, when the child was questioned in February by a social worker assigned to the Sensitive Case Unit of L.A.'s Department of Children & Family Services (DCFS), he "denied any form of sexual abuse" by Jackson and said that he never "slept in the same bed as the entertainer." While not specifically named in the DCFS memo, the 45-year-old Jackson is referred to repeatedly as "the entertainer."

The report says the probe began with a call from a school official to an abuse hotline after the airing of the 20/20 documentary in February. [link via Drudge]

Update: News coverage: Here and here.

If you need a laugh today, Atrios supplies it. The background is here. [link to background via Poor Man, who is often very funny]

Today is election day in San Francisco for Mayor. It's liberal Democrat establishment candidate Gavin Newsom vs. progressive Green party candidate (and former Democrat and public defender) Matt Gonzales. Gavin is heavily favored, having the support of outgoing mayor Willie Brown, Bill Clinton, Al Gore and the San Francisco Chronicle. Clinton was in SF yesterday, stumping for Gavin.

We think Matt Gonzales will make a respectable showing. The San Franisco Chronicle recently ran its Editorial Board interview with Gonzales.

While both candidates are progressive, Gonzales is more so. The AP puts it this way:

The candidates have such similar positions that both would be considered liberals in almost any city outside California. But in this race, which has hinged as much on looks and lifestyles as their approaches to homelessness and economic development, Newsom has been cast as a Republican in liberal's clothing, Gonzalez the fringe spoiler.

Gonzales put it this way:

"It will be a test of who turns out to vote," said Gonzalez, whose campaign has attracted a mix of college students, unemployed dot-commers, artists and activists old enough to remember the 1960s.

"You have to give us some props for putting this thing together and bringing it to this place," Gonzalez told reporters Monday. "We've assaulted the traditional ideas of politics."

Check out John Nichols' OnLine Beat in The Nation discussing the race. And here's a list of bloggers for Matt.

If you're looking for enlightenment about the death penalty from this year's crop of Democratic presidential contenders, you're unlikely to find it. Only Kucinich, Sharpton and Mosely Braun oppose it. This article in the Boston Globe traces the other six candidates' evolving positions on capital punishment--three, Dean, Lieberman and Edwards, have moved from opposing it to supporting it--at least in limited situations.

The article traces the shift first to 1988 and the disasterous Michael Dukakis bid for President:

In 1988, Dukakis's stock crashed after he was asked whether he would favor the death penalty if his wife was raped and murdered. He replied with detachment: "I don't see any evidence that it's a deterrent, and I think there are better and more effective ways to deal with violent crime. We've done so in my own state." He went on to lose 40 states to George H. W. Bush.

The 1992 emergence of Bill Clinton, who supported the death penalty, was another factor. Here are the shifts among the major candidates:

It's official. Al Gore has endorsed Howard Dean for President:

Gore said Dean "really is the only candidate who has been able to inspire at the grass-roots level all over the country." He said the former Vermont governor also was the only Democratic candidate who made the correct judgment about the Iraq war.

"Our country has been weakened in its ability to fight the war against terror because of the catastrophic mistake the Bush administration made in taking us into war in Iraq," Gore said.

Gore is flying with Dean to Iowa today to campaign there. The AP describes the effect of Dean's endorsement this way:

The approval of Bill Clinton's No. 2 bolsters Dean's case that he can carry the party's mantle in November and represents more than an Internet-driven outsider relying on the support of largely white, upscale voters.

Joe Lieberman appeared on the Today Show this morning and said Gore's move "caught him completely off guard." And he got in one dig at Gore:

Asked on "Today" whether he felt betrayed by the former vice president, Lieberman said, "I'm not going to talk about Al Gore's sense of loyalty this morning."

Update: Here's the story on the secret plotting behind the endorsement.

Update: A new cnn/gallup poll shows Dean ahead in the Democratic race for the first time.

Twenty-five percent of registered voters who identify with or lean to the Democratic Party say they are supporting Dean for the nomination. Retired Gen. Wesley Clark ranks second with 17 percent. Three weeks ago, Dean and Clark were tied at 17 percent." [link via Political Wire.]

Update: Lieberman fights back.

The death of John Lennon on Dec. 8, 1980 outside his New York Apartment building around 10:00 p.m has always held a special meaning for the TalkLeft family.

I was 3 1/2 weeks overdue with my first child. On Dec. 8, I went to the hosptial in the afternoon to be induced. It didn't work, they sent me home. At bedtime, my then-husband and I were in bed-- he was watching Monday Night Football, I was reading a book. All of a sudden, Howard Cosell's huge voice boomed out: "An unspeakable tragedy this evening in New York City. John Lennon has been shot."

The minute I heard that I gasped and felt a pop--the shock of the news had caused my water to break. We went racing to the hospital. We learned John Lennon was dead. Within 2 hours, at 1am on Dec. 9, our son Nic was born. I have always believed, and told him, that when John Lennon's spirit went out, his came in. So for the past 23 years, this day is not only a celebration of a birthday, but a time to reflect on the nature of the extradordinary soul who has touched my son's soul.

Nic is in his first year of law school. But his first passion is for his music--he plays guitar. Whenever we are in NY together, we visit sidewalk art shows in lower downtown and pick up some Lennon memorabilia. Nic feels the connection too.

So, on this birthday eve for Nic, I wish him success at whichever endeavor --law or music, he chooses. And to John Lennon, we wish eternal peace.

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