The Christian Science Monitor reports today on the move to provide ex-felons with the right to vote. 37 states now allow ex-felons to vote. That leaves 13 more we need to work on. The Sentencing Project i s leading the charge:

A recent study by The Sentencing Project, a nonprofit criminal-justice advocacy organization, found that as a result of the changes since 1996, 471,000 ex-cons have had voting rights restored. But the study also estimates that 3.9 million Americans - 1 in 50 adults - can't vote. And because of the racial imbalance in the criminal justice system, a large percentage of them are minority. Indeed, 1.4 million black men are disenfranchised. That's 13 percent of the African-American male population, a figure seven times the national average.

"The irony is that 50 years after Brown v. the Board of Education ... we actually see increasing numbers of people of color losing their voting rights," says Marc Mauer of The Sentencing Project.

....The American public has a fairly clear stance. In a poll commissioned .... last year, 80 percent favored giving all ex-cons the right to vote. But only 31 percent favored extending voting rights to those currently serving their time.

As we point out here, quoting from an op-ed in the Los Angeles Times, restoring the vote to ex-felons should be a priority of the Democratic party:

Watching the California recall debate, we heard Cruz Bustamante give his ideas for balancing the budget: Increase cigarette and alcohol taxes and raise income taxes on the state's wealthiest 4%.

A smoker's tax hurts the poor. Cruz should come up with a new plan.

Arianna's attacks on Arnold's treatment of women were in poor taste and in our view, backfired.

Bustamante was good on health care for children of undocumented residents, but his delivery lacked passion.

For more on the recall debate: Live: The Arnold and Arianna Show

Based on this debate, we have to say we think if the recall succeeds, Arnold will win the Governor's race. We like Arnold, but our opinion remains the same: Vote no on recall.

A new NBC-Wall Street Journal poll shows that Bush's approval rating has dropped to its lowest level ever--49%.

From the Marijuana Policy Project:

Two of the leading candidates -- former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean and
U.S. Sen. John Kerry (MA) -- markedly improved their respective positions on medical marijuana. Dean agreed to impose a moratorium on the DEA's raids on medical marijuana patients and providers in states that have reduced or eliminated criminal penalties for the medical use of marijuana. And Kerry said he would stop the raids entirely.

...U.S. Sen. John Edwards from North Carolina has been the primary target of our protests. He seems almost proud to have adopted the position that seriously ill people should be put in prison for following the advice of their physicians.

All of our hard work paid a huge dividend at a town hall meeting in Henniker on Saturday, September 20. MPP's New Hampshire project, Granite Staters for Medical Marijuana (GSMM), asked John Kerry, "Would you stop the raids, as president?" Kerry responded by saying simply, "Yes." This came one day after Howard Dean, in response to a GSMM question, pledged, "Will I do what Attorney General] Ashcroft is doing? No, absolutely not." GSMM then specifically asked, "You would stop the raids?" and Dean responded, "Yeah, I'm not going to do that, anyway." To read about these encounters in greater detail, please see our press release.

Good for Dean and Kerry....Edwards needs to catch up.

Our Altercation column is up. A big thanks to Eric for asking us to fill in for him today.

It's official. There's no Patriot Act in the NBA:

NBA Commissioner David Stern said Monday that Kobe Bryant should continue to play for the Lakers this season, even as Bryant faces a potential trial for a sexual assault charge in Colorado.

"Absolutely," Stern said. "We don't have a Patriot Act in the NBA. That means that you're innocent until proven guilty. If every time someone was accused and there were allegations, they were required to stop their life, that wouldn't be a good thing. That could be their choice, but they shouldn't be forced to [stop]."

[thanks to Steve Smith for the heads up yesterday on this, we're just a little late getting to it.]

Confirmation hearings for Bush judicial nominee Charles Pickering are on deck in the Senate Judiciary Committee. Pickering is up for a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit.

The reaction was immediate from liberal groups.

"Judge Pickering's disturbing record exemplifies this administration's efforts to appoint judges who are far out of the mainstream to lifetime seats on the federal bench," said Ralph Neas, president of People For the American Way. "We are aware of nothing that has altered Judge Pickering's record since the committee's vote to reject his confirmation to the Fifth Circuit."

Pickering, a U.S. District judge in Hattiesburg, Miss., was defeated 10-9 in March 2001 when Democrats were in control of the committee. This came after civil rights groups said he supported segregation as a young man in Mississippi. Pickering's opponents also pointed to his conservative voting record as a Mississippi state lawmaker and decisions as a judge.

If Pickering makes it out of the committee, Democrats have promised a filibuster. Hold them to it. You can read all of our Pickering coverage here.

The National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL) has issued a press release applauding the Judicial Conference statement on the need for judicial discretion in sentencing. We wrote about this for Altercation today, so head over there this afternoon for more details.

Back in 1997, then-Senator John Ashcroft had a different view of government surveillance. How do we make him rediscover his inner child?

[Senator Ashcroft takes issue with administration views on the Internet
and the use of encryption technology.]

The Clinton administration would like the Federal government to have the capability to read any international or domestic computer communications. The FBI wants access to decode, digest, and discuss financial transactions, personal e-mail, and proprietary information sent abroad -- all in the name of national security. To accomplish this, President Clinton would like government agencies to have the keys for decoding all exported U.S. software and Internet communications.

This proposed policy raises obvious concerns about Americans' privacy, in addition to tampering with the competitive advantage that our U.S. software companies currently enjoy in the field of encryption technology. Not only would Big Brother be looming over the shoulders of international cyber-surfers, but the administration threatens to render our state-of-the-art computer software engineers obsolete and unemployed.

There is a concern that the Internet could be used to commit crimes and that advanced encryption could disguise such activity. However, we do not provide the government with phone jacks outside our homes for unlimited wiretaps. Why, then, should we grant government the Orwellian capability to listen at will and in real time to our communications across the Web?

The National Institute of Justice, the research arm of the Department of Justice, has just released Technical Working Group for Eyewitness Evidence: Training Teams, a Trainer's Manual for Law Enforcement. This manual is the followup to the the 1999 NIJ Research Report, Eyewitness Evidence: A Guide for Law Enforcement. Both are available free to download.

It has been known for several years that faulty eyewitness evidence is the major cause of wrongful convictions. In most cases, the eyewitnesses are mistaken, not lying. Faulty eyewitness identification procedures used by police have been a large part of the problem. The procedures in these guides, if used by law enforcement, will go a long way towards reducing such errors.

We are proud to have been a member of the panel that produced the 1999 Guide and look forward to seeing its prinicples put into action in police departments around the country, through the new Training Manual.

We'd also like to see police departments go further and adopt sequential lineups and double-blind testing procedures, which are mentioned in the 1999 manual but not given the same endorsement as the other procedures.

In case you're wondering how Ashcroft and the DEA intend to prove that the pipe you sell is for marijuana use and not tobacco, defense lawyer Nicholas Hentoff has this report:

They have agents who will testify that any smoking device with a "one hit" or very shallow bowl depth constitutes paraphernalia since this design is inconsistent with Tobacco use. The presence of a carburetor also constitutes proof of paraphernalia since no one uses a carburetor to blast tobacco smoke into their lungs.

They also will call a tobacco shop owner as an expert on these points as well as tobacco trade show operators who will testify that they exclude smoking devices from their trade shows based on bowl depth and presence of carbs. Rolling papers with wires in them also constitute paraphernalia per DEA experts.

We'll be altercating over at MSNBC's Altercation Wednesday, filling in for the moving Eric Alterman. Don't forget to stop by. Charles Pierce fills in today--taking on John Ashcroft and his fervor for the death penalty, among other topics. Charles is a tough act to follow, but we'll give it our best. As he points out, altercating is a far better job than moving Eric's boxes.