A Wisconsin judge has blocked the state's new union law.

For those of you not following March Madness, here's an open thread for all other topics.

Talk about it here.

Did the efforts to boycott Arizona have some impact? The answer is yes. After passing the deplorable SB 1070, yesterday the Arizona Senate defeated five new restrictive immigration bills.

One bill would have denied citizenship to children of undocumented residents (not a chance it would have passed a judicial challenge if enacted.) The others bills would:

• Require hospitals to make an effort to determine if the people they are treating are here legally.
• Restrict the registration of vehicles to only legal residents.
• Bar admission into state universities and community colleges to anyone who cannot prove citizenship or legal residency.

Other provisions in the bills would have required cities to evict all residents of a public housing unit if just one resident is undocumented, required parents to show proof of citizenship or lawful presence when enrolling a child in school, and made it a crime for an undocumented resident to drive in Arizona.

Republicans voting against the bill said the boycott had an effect. [More...]

The Phoenix Police Department says it needs more manpower to fight the increased number of kidnapping and home invasions in the city. But last month, Phoenix Police Chief Jack Harris was reassigned due to an investigation into alleged inflated kidnapping statistics by the department. Why would police fudge those statistics? To qualify for a $1.7 million federal grant.

The ATF has recently come under heavy criticism for its reverse stings, particularly those involving guns ending up in Mexico.

So what happens? The ATF teams up with the Phoenix Police. Six ATF agents have been permanently assigned to the Phoenix police Kidnapping and Home Invasion Unit. [More...]

The U.N. has authorized military strikes and imposed a "no fly zone" in Libya. Secretary of State Clinton said in Tunisia today.

"...that a no-fly zone would include "certain actions taken to protect the planes and the pilots, including bombing targets like the Libyan defense systems."

The U.S. is monitoring inbound flights from Japan for radiation. So far, there's no cause for concern. Also, the U.S. has chartered flights to evacuate family members of state department officials from the Northeast region of Japan. [More...]

The Inter-American Commission on Human Rights has released its December, 2010 report critical of U.S. detention policy for immigrants. The focus of the report is on ICE’s civil immigration operations. From the Report's Introduction:

the Inter-American Commission is convinced that in many if not the majority of cases, detention is a disproportionate measure and the alternatives to detention programs would be a more balanced means of serving the State’s legitimate interest in ensuring compliance with immigration laws. The IACHR is disturbed by the rapid increase in the number of partnerships with local and state law enforcement for purposes of enforcing civil immigration laws.

The Inter-American Commission finds that ICE has failed to develop an oversight and accountability system to ensure that these local partners do not enforce immigration law in a discriminatory manner by resorting to racial profiling and that their practices do not use the supposed investigation of crimes as a pretext to prosecute and detain undocumented migrants.

The New York Times has more here.

Jeh Johnson, the General Counsel for the Department of Defense, is urging Congress not to rule out civilian trials of detainees.

Jeh (Jay) Johnson said a Republican bill to virtually remove the civilian option would make it more likely that courts would step in when detainees challenge their detentions. He testified Thursday before the House Armed Services Committee.

Carol Rosenberg at the Miami Herald has much more on new Republican efforts to prevent closing Gitmo:

But the focus was the Republican draft legislation that would further thwart Obama’s efforts to close the detention center in southeast Cuba. It also would give the defense secretary rather than the attorney general final say on keeping a detainee in military custody. The bill imposes such tough requirements on transfers of the last Guantánamo captives that Defense Secretary Robert Gates has said he might not be able to approve any release.

Best line from the hearing:

They turn Guantánamo Bay into the Hotel California,” said the top Democrat on the committee, Washington Rep. Adam Smith. “You can check out any time you want but you can never leave.”

[More...]

In a letter to the City Attorney of Oakland last month, CA, U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag "clarified" the Justice Department's position on federal prosecution involving medical marijuana, and specifically, cultivation authorized by state or municipal law.

The Oakland City Attorney had asked for guidance on Oakland's Medical Cannabis Cultivation Ordinance. U.S. Attorney Haag responds that DOJ is familiar with Oakland's solicitation of applications for permits to operate "industrial cannabis cultivation and manufacturing facilities" pursuant to Oakland Ordinance No. 13033 (Oakland Ordinance)." After consulting with the Attorney General, she says she is writing to clarify DOJ's position:

The prosecution of individuals and organizations involved in the trade of any illegal drugs and the disruption of drug trafficking organizations is a core priority of the Department. This core priority includes prosecution of business enterprises that unlawfully market and sell marijuana.

[More..]

Wisconsin marijuana activist Ben Masel is well known to readers of TalkLeft. He's been a frequent commenter here for many years.

I'm so sad to read this interview with Ben today, in the Wisconsin State Journal. Ben has terminal, stage IV lung cancer, that has "metastasized past a cure." Ben says the treatment plan has gone from "cure" to "contain."

Ben is undergoing radiation, and will start chemotherapy in May. He still plans on being in Denver in April for a NORML conference. I look forward to finally meeting him in person.

Our best thoughts go out to Ben. Feel free to leave him yours in comments.

It's been a wild day already.

Talk about it here.

Let's Go Gators!

The House today voted to strip NPR of federal funding.

It's a symbolic vote. Democrats in the Senate won't pass it, if they will even allow it to reach a vote. And the White House opposes it, and President Obama would veto it.

With all the problems going on in the world, it's ridiculous that Republicans would waste time on something like this.

The Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division, has issued a report finding the New Orleans police department engaged in misconduct that violated the Constitution and federal laws.

Among the findings are that the police department has used excessive force, made unconstitutional stops and searches, and illegally profiled people based on race, ethnicity and sexual orientation. The investigation also found a number of practices that contributed to the illegal conduct, including failed systems for recruiting and promoting officers, poor training and lack of supervision, among others.

The report finds the misconduct is "serious, wide-ranging, systemic and deeply rooted in the culture of the department." [More...]