Legal experts say Attorney General John Ashcroft's Death Penalty Edict could backfire:

Forcing United States attorneys to seek the death penalty could result in unwanted ripple effects, such as more frequent acquittals... There is also a risk that jurors who believe that a defendant does not warrant capital punishment could vote to acquit him on capital charges, or that judges who think the government has overreached could try to undermine prosecutors' cases, several former prosecutors said.

"The judge can take it out on you with all sorts of discretionary rulings," said Jamie Orenstein, a federal prosecutor in Brooklyn in the 1990's and a member in 2000 of the committee that reviewed death penalty cases for Attorney General Janet Reno.

"It's the exhibit that the judge doesn't admit," Mr. Orenstein said. "It's the objection to the prosecution's testimony that the judge sustains. It's the juror with qualms about the death penalty who the judge allows onto the jury."

The Washington Post reports today that Bush's budget hurts the poor.

The $2.23 trillion budget that Bush proposed to Congress last week would loosen federal standards and hand states vast new authority, if they want it, over housing subsidies, unemployment benefits, health insurance, and a preschool program for children from disadvantaged families, which is known as Head Start.

It would also make outright cuts in some poverty programs, such as a reduction by a fourth in the amount the government devoted last year to "community services" grants for dispossessed neighborhoods.

At the same time, the president is seeking nearly $1.5 trillion in tax cuts that would largely benefit the wealthy while potentially squeezing social spending for years to come.

These are not the same positions Bush endorsed when running for President. These are a continuation of Reagan "trickle down" economics--with a new label--"circular economics". Apparently, Bush has even more in store for us.

The president has not even publicly acknowledged this year's most dramatic tax proposal -- a plan to establish new savings accounts that would allow families to shield tens of thousands of dollars a year from all capital gains, interest and dividend taxation.... ...Policy analysts across the ideological spectrum say that the changes imbedded in Bush's budget, if adopted, would be virtually unrivaled in scale and scope. "Just the sheer volume of proposals . . . across an array of low-income programs . . . is breathtaking," said Mark Greenberg, policy director of the Center for Law and Social Policy, a nonprofit group that specializes in family and welfare issues.

To get around suggestions that he is cutting federal dollars from the budget for social programs, Bush has decided to merely transfer responsibility for running the programs to the states. Analysts say this is unwise:

"Offering state block grants in the middle of the most severe state fiscal crisis we've seen in a long time -- with little or no new federal aid -- almost guarantees that states will either fail to take up the option or that they will use the money in inappropriate ways," Isabel V. Sawhill, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution, said at a gathering of policy analysts held to assess the budget.

Bush's changes for Medicaid are sounding some of the loudest alarm bells among policy analysts and Democrats. After that come his changes to the school lunch program.

Barry Sackin, a vice president of the American School Food Service Association, said that he, too, thinks only eligible students should receive free meals, but that some of the methods the administration is contemplating would cause "collateral damage," mistakenly denying help to children who should get it.

Maureen Dowd is great in Desert Spring, Sprung, up now on the New York Times website. It's hard to pick just a few paragraphs to quote, but these should do:

The orange alert made me wonder again why the Bush administration has spent the last year and a half hyping the Iraqi menace instead of singlemindedly hunting Al Qaeda.

Mr. Bush's presidency came into focus when he made his bullhorn vow to get "the people who knocked these buildings down." But we're not getting the creeps who knocked the buildings down. We're getting the creeps whose address we know....

Once they scratch their Saddam itch, maybe the Bush team can zero in on the terrorists who have put us on code orange, and the North Koreans who have put us on nuclear notice.

IsThatLegal? says they have come up with the goods to make Coble apologize. Tonight and tomorrow, Prof. Muller is posting scanned copies of original documents that show the Japanese were not put into internment camps for their own benefit. The document he has up tonight is a memorandum dated February 12, 1942, from Attorney General Francis Biddle to Secretary of War Henry Stimson.

Prof. Muller points out that the memo clearly says the Japanese issue is a military one. Had it been for protection of the Japanese, he says, the Department of Justice or another law enforcement group would have had responsibility for oversight.

There's more, go over and have a look.

If you are in the San Francisco area this week, Gary Hart will be speaking at these events:

February 10, 2003:
"Principled Engagement: America's Role in the World of the 21st Century"
World Affairs Council and the Council on Foreign Relations

Registration Begins at 5:00 PM, Program is from 6–7:00 PM

Grand Ballroom, Omni Hotel
500 California
San Francisco, CA

More details here.

February 11, 2003:
"Principled Engagement: A New Foreign Policy Framework"
The International Law Society and the American Constitution Society

1:00–2:00PM

Stanford Law School
Room 290
Stanford, CA

More details here.

UPI Senior News Analyst Martin Sieff asks in his latest commentary, Is Bush competent? As to his ability to run the nation, Sieff answers with a resounding "no."

You know it's all going downhill after Sieff says, "Consider, the president inherited a United States blessed with peace, prosperity, a booming stock market and a healthy annual budget surplus. It now has none of those things."

Go read the whole thing.

Robert Ambroggi, a lawyer in Rockport, MA, Legal Tech Writer and author of the book, " The Essential Guide to the Best (and Worst) Legal Sites on the Web," has written not one, but three columns on law blogs in recent months for Law Technology News. Find out what you're missing.

The Year's Most Laudable Web Site Launches (November, 2002)

Many Blawgs Provide Practical Information (December, 2002)

Lawyers as Pundits by Way of the Web (January, 2003)

Ambroggi also has own blog, LawSites, that tracks new and intriguing Web sites for lawyers.

IssuesGuy of Seeing the Forest has put together an impressive array of articles on the voting machine controversy.

Lisa English, of Ruminate this, is outraged, here are her thoughts on the black box voting revelations.

According to the BBC today, here's how the U.N. Security Council stands on War with Iraq:

For military action: US*, UK*, Spain and Bulgaria

Sceptics or opposed: France*, Russia*, China*, Germany and Syria

In doubt: Angola, Cameroon, Chile, Guinea, Mexico and Pakistan

Nine votes and no veto required to pass a resolution

*veto-wielding countries

The BBC reports that U.N. Chief Kofi Annan is requesting that the U.S. "allow the UN to decide collectively whether to launch a war on Iraq. Mr Annan said military action should only be taken when all other means of disarming Iraq had failed," and "The UN is most successful to all its members, including the US, when it is united and works as a source of collective action."

Also, Germany is challenging the Bush Administration's war plans.

German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer has directly challenged the United States over the justifications for possible military action against Iraq.
"I am not convinced... I cannot go to the public and say these are the reasons because I don't believe in them," he told a European defence conference in Munich.

More than 10,000 protesters took to the streets in Munich outside the conference.

ScrappleFace has more on the Patriot Act II, including the Glass Houses Provision. [link via Instapundit]

Update: On a more serious note, Warblogging says:

Fortunately the Domestic Security Enhancement Act of 2003 hasn't become law yet. Fortunately it hasn't even been sent to Congress yet (beyond the copies sent to Speaker Hastert and Vice President Cheney). But it will be sent, mark my words. It must be defeated. I say again, must be defeated.

Please write your congressmen, write your senators. Write to anyone who will listen. Call CNN, call the New York Times and USA Today. Tell them that you demand prime time and front page coverage of DSEA. Tell them that you want analysis of how this law effects civil liberties in this country.

Tell them that you're an American, that you want to be free. [link via The Agonist]

[comments now closed]

TalkLeft is moving dns servers and may be down for 24 to 48 hours starting soon. Please read our friends on the right in the meantime.

Update: We're still here so maybe it was a false alarm.

The Rolling Stones gave a free concert in Los Angeles for an environmental cause--Bill Clinton was the warmup speaker.

Once the Stones committed to do the free concert for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), the nonprofit organization distributed 12,000 tickets via sweepstakes to anyone who wanted them. ... Clinton urged the crowd to demand cars that use cleaner fuel, lightbulbs that are more energy-efficient and increased use of solar power. The crowd cheered.

The concert came to be largely due to the work of Steven Bing, Hollywood producer and heir to an estimated $600-million real estate fortune and a major donor to the environmentally conscious NRDC.