I just got online and saw the news about the Boston Marathon bombing. How awful. Here's a thread to discuss it.

Update: Miami Herald reporter Carol Rosenberg is back at Guantanamo. The Pentagon now says 45 of the 166 detainees as on hunger strikes, 13 are on tube feeds, and two are hospitalized for observation. Follow her on Twitter, she posts frequent and accurate updates.

Those kids, they sure do "the darndest things." This story about a six year old who took the family car to get more chinese food from the restaurant his family had eaten at the night before, and made it three miles before being stopped by the cops, made me laugh.

Is force-feeding the hunger striking detainees at Guantanamo torture? The group Physicians for Human Rights says it is.

This is an open thread, all topics welcome.

If anyone besides me was worried that the big snowstorm Denver is getting today and tomorrow will interfere with Bon Jovi's arrival for tomorrow night's show, you can rest easy. Phil X (the terrific guitarist who is taking Richie Sambora's place on this leg of the tour) tweeted this photo last night at 10:45 p.m. after their Des Moines show. They were on the plane, waiting for takeoff, Ketel One and Pelegrino bottles already out.

36 hours and counting. [More...]

Yemeni detainee Samir Naji al Hasan Moqbel is one of the many prisoners at Guantanammo on a hunger strike. He has been held for 11 years, never been charged with a crime, and cleared for release.

He tells his story in an op-ed in the New York Times, Guantanamo is Killing me. It's very disturbing to read. You wouldn't do a dog this way.

Shame on us. The U.S. needs to send these men home.

The Denver Post has an article today on Denver billionaire Phil Anschutz who is taking a greater role in his expanding sports and entertainment ventures in Los Angeles. Anschutz, who rarely gives interviews and is very private, has been on a "media tour" in the past month. He gave his first media interview in decades. The reason: He's trying to bring an NFL team back to Los Angeles. The team would play at his Farmers Field stadium.

[Last month] Anschutz embarked on a Southern California publicity tour. Area sportswriters and business officials were taken aback not only by his decision to grant his first extensive media interview in decades, but by the sight of Anschutz sitting courtside at an L.A. Lakers game at Staples Center.

I'm not interested in whether Anschutz and AEG bring an NFL team to L.A. I just want to know why the Rolling Stones aren't coming to Denver since Anschutz is bankrolling the tour-- epecially since it was the Stones that reached out to AEG not the other way around. [More...]

Militants in Somalia attack the Supreme Court. All 9 attackers, most wearing suicide vests, were killed, court was in session, and hostages were taken. These AP photos show a ravaged city and incredible poverty. A burning car, rescue efforts, a woman with a baby trying to get to safety, one of the injured clinging to the pants of the soldier trying to help him, a little girl and her brother running to safety.

In the random acts of violence department: In Long Beach, CA, a man goes to a 7-11 and a homeless man throws a flammable object in his car.
[More...]

Russia has responded to the U.S. issuing a list of sanctioned Russians yesterday by putting out its own list of U.S. officials engaged in human rights violations.

The list includes Bush torture memo author John Yoo and Dick Cheney's former chief of staff, David Addington, and some Guantanamo officials. I wonder why they left Dick Cheney off the list.

Russia's list also includes Preet Bharara, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York, who prosecuted Viktor Bout and pilot Konstantin Yaroshenko (African drug sting case.) [more...]

In a strongly worded 71 page opinion, a three judge panel from the Eastern District of California has threatened California Governor Jerry Brown with contempt for failing to come up with a plan to reduce California's prison population. The court has given Brown and the state numerous chances. The Supreme Court denied Brown's appeal and he still refuses to comply.

The April 5 opinion is here. The docket with links to other court orders is here. [More...]

Guards at Guantanamo this morning conducted a pre-dawn raid of Camp 6, the communal housing block where most of the inmates are on a hunger strike. The purpose was to move the hunger-striking inmates to maximum security cells.

The detainees fought back. According to Guantanamo officials:

“Some detainees resisted with improvised weapons, and in response, four less-than-lethal rounds were fired,” according to a statement issued by the prison camps at the U.S. Navy base in Cuba. “There were no serious injuries to guards or detainees.”

....“In order to reestablish proper observation, the guards entered the Camp 6 communal living spaces to transition detainees into single cells, remove obstructions to cameras, windows and partitions, and to assess the medical condition of each detainee,” the prison said.

Yesterday, Guantanamo's prison camp Commander was replaced. [More...]

It's a jail day for me, here's an open thread for you, all topics welcome.

In the "More dollars Down the Drain" department: Here's a summary of the 2014 Homeland Security Budget.

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) – $10.4 billion

This funding will provide for 21,370 Border Patrol agents and 21,775 CBP officers – maintaining the largest personnel totals in history.

The bill also provides $324 million for border security fencing, infrastructure, and technology.

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A military commissions judge at Guantanamo has delayed proceedings in the case of Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri for two months due to the discovery by an IT team that 540,000 private defense emails were made available to the prosecution.

The mishandling of the e-mails was detected when IT specialists were conducting a search of the government’s computer system on behalf of prosecutors in a particular case. When they did so, they came across not only the e-mails they were seeking but also e-mails between defense lawyers.

[More...]