If my kid, when he was a kid, was strip searched in the 8th grade at school because they thought he had ibuprophen, I would have been up in arms.

Tuesday, the Supreme Court hears arguments in the case of an Arizona student who was strip searched at school.

Savana Redding was an honors student at a middle school in Safford, Ariz., with a clean discipline record. A friend of Savana’s, who was found in possession of pain relievers, told school authorities that Savana had given her 400-milligram ibuprofen pills, a prescription -level dose of the pain reliever in over-the-counter Advil and Motrin, used to treat headaches and menstrual cramps.

I don't care if it was percodan or dilaudid. You don't strip search kids. [More...]

The Constitution Project has issued the most comprehensive report in 30 years on the constitutional right to counsel.

Excessive caseloads, inadequate funding, ethical breaches, politicization of the public defender system, lack of timely appointment of counsel or no appointment at all are depriving the poor of the constitutional right to representation in criminal and juvenile cases. This is the conclusion of a report released today by the Constitution Project’s bipartisan National Right to Counsel Committee. The report, Justice Denied: America’s Continuing Neglect of Our Constitutional Right to Counsel, outlines the crisis in the country’s public defense system and offers 22 recommendations to state and federal officials to fix it.

The report includes recommendations for adequate funding, independent oversight, and standards for attorney competence, compensation, and workload.

A summary of findings is here, and the full report is downloadable here (pdf).

Across the country, tomorrow will see the biggest 4/20 events to legalize marijuana ever. As the New York Times explains:

April 20 has long been an unofficial day of celebration for marijuana fans, an occasion for campus smoke-outs, concerts and cannabis festivals. But some advocates of legal marijuana say this year’s “high holiday” carries extra significance as they sense increasing momentum toward acceptance of the drug, either as medicine or entertainment.

“It is the biggest moment yet,” said Ethan Nadelmann, the founder and executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance in Washington, who cited several national polls showing growing support for legalization. “There’s a sense that the notion of legalizing marijuana is starting to cross the fringes into mainstream debate.”

You can stay on top of all the goings on at NORML, especially their twitter feed and their special site created for tomorrow, 420MoneyBomb.

Rahmbo talks:

STEPHANOPOLOUS: The President has ruled out prosecutions of CIA officials who believed they were following the law. Does he believe the officials who devised the policies should be immune from prosecution? . . . [W]hat about those who devised the policies?

EMANUEL: [President Obama] believes that they . . . should not be prosecuted either. And it's not the place that we go -- as he said in that letter, and I really recommend that people look at that full statement. Not the letter, the statement. In that second paragraph: This is not a time for retribution. It's a time for reflection. It is not a time to use our energy and our time in looking back, and in a sense of anger and retribution. . . .

Um, is it ok if we talk about it President Obama? Personally, as I have written before, I can accept this policy IF the President supports a full investigation via a Truth and Reconciliation Commission (even Fred Hiatt supports this idea.) That seems to not be in the cards.

Speaking for me only

A lot of talk about Cuba the past few days. Here is one aspect of the goings on:

On Cuba, [Obama] said Castro should release political prisoners, embrace democratic freedoms and cut fees on the money that Cuban-Americans send back to their families.

Will it happen? No. Will the embargo be lifted? No. I could be wrong of course.

Speaking for me only

Your turn.

This is an Open Thread.

Devilstower, a great writer, pens a quite misguided piece about the tea parties, ascribing much more potential to it than it deserves. In particular, Devilstower is wrong to separate it from the Republican Party. Devilstower writes:

This wasn't a tax protest or a conservative movement, it was the semi-regular Gathering of the Disaffected. . . . Like the folks who backed Perot, the baggies are not Republicans. . . . What started on April 15th might actually be the beginning of a movement. And just because third parties haven't be successful in the last 150 years is no guarantee that they'll continue to be unsuccessful for the next 150, or even the next five. One of these days, candidates with letters other then (D) and (R) after their names will take their seats in Congress. One of these days we'll have a president from some party you've never heard of.

This strikes me as completely wrong. [More...]

Americans (and citizens of other democracies) have long resisted the concept of a national identity card. Despite the widespread use of social security numbers as identifiers and the Bush administration's rabid support of Real ID, American citizens who do not drive or fly or work can get by without carrying a mandated identification document.

Will DNA databases make the fear of a national identity card obsolete?

©riminal justice experts ... worry that the nation is becoming a genetic surveillance society.

States routinely take DNA samples from convicted felons. Some states have started to collect DNA from individuals convicted of misdemeanors and from minors. Even more disturbing is the latest trend in privacy violations: DNA collection upon arrest, from individuals who are presumed innocent. The FBI has adopted that practice and expects a 17-fold increase in the size of its database by 2012. {more ...]

April 19, 1995. It was the largest act of domestic terrorism in the history of the country. Until September 11, it was the largest act of mass murder in the United States. It left 168 people dead and more than 500 people injured.

It was a massive case (pdf) to defend. There were:

• 30,000 interviews of witnesses taken by the FBI and other government agencies.
• More than 200,000 photographs
• Records of 156 million telephone calls and over one million hotel and motel registrations
• Over 500 hours of audio tape and over 400 hours of video tape.
• 25,000 pages of lab reports and worksheets
• 23,000 pieces of evidence

It cost the Government $82 million to investigate and prosecute and $10 to $15 million to defend.[More...]

It's still snowing. I'm going to spend the day on the couch in front of the fireplace, listening to music while I read yet more wiretap affidavits and draft more motions to suppress that are due Monday.

What's going on in your world today?

Yesterday, implicated Bush Administration officials Michael Mukasey and Michael Hayden decried the release of the Bush Administration torture memos:

Proponents of the release have argued that the techniques . . . cost us more in the coin of world opinion than they were worth. [This] claim [does not] survive[] scrutiny.

While Mukasey and Hayden do not explain why it does not survive scrutiny, they are surprisingly countered by torture advocate David Rivkin:

Via Jane Hamsher@ Twitter:

So how many times have you watched Susan Boyle?

My answer: At least six, I never get tired of watching it. She was great on Larry King Live tonight as well. I don't know which I like watching more, her singing or the judges' and audience reaction to her when she first started to sing. (Video link here.)

It's great that one person can make so many people in so many countries smile. More than 30 million viewers on You Tube in under a week. I wonder if that's a record.

The reaction among commenters here the other night were terrific. I'm reprinting a few below: [More...]