Actors in adult movies filmed in America’s pornography capital would be required to use condoms under an ordinance granted final approval Tuesday by the Los Angeles City Council.

The measure, adopted 9-1, next goes to the mayor for his signature. Before it can take effect, however, the City Council has ordered police officials, the city attorney and others to hold meetings to figure out how it might be enforced. (emphasis mine)

…maybe they should’ve thought about that before they passed the damn thing in the first place?

A Justice Department opinion dated September and made public on Friday reversed decades of previous policy that included civil and criminal charges against operators of some of the most popular online poker sites.

Until now, the department held that online gambling in all forms was illegal under the Wire Act of 1961, which bars wagers via telecommunications that cross state lines or international borders.

The new interpretation, by the department’s Office of Legal Counsel, said the Wire Act applies only to bets on a “sporting event or contest,” not to a state’s use of the Internet to sell lottery tickets to adults within its borders or abroad. [...] The question at issue was whether proposals by Illinois and New York to use the Internet and out-of-state transaction processors to sell lottery tickets to in-state adults violated the Wire Act.

This sounds more like “State-run lotteries get expansion of artificial market dominance” to me.  How does this narrow reconsideration by request of state lotteries open up non-state-run betting?

For all the risk described with online gambling, it’s revealing how this is targeted and how little it has to do with said risk.  You can blow thousands on E-trade or whatever all you want, but gawd forbid you play poker or bet on a fight regardless of amount.  Meanwhile, betting directly through state government is totally different because The People Are The Real Winners or something.

After seven days of testimony and the submission of more than 300,000 pages of documents, a key question remains unanswered in the case against Army Pfc. Bradley Manning:

How exactly did his leak of hundreds of thousands of secret documents, logs and at least one video — which he passed to WikiLeaks — directly harm U.S. national security? [...] As both sides gave closing arguments Thursday, the government presented no evidence of a death, injury or harm done to the United States that was caused by the release of the information. Instead, military prosecutors argued that Manning knew that what he was doing was illegal and could help America’s enemies, which they specified as terrorist organizations. (emphasis mine)

Information leaks as they stand are a gray area, one where the difference between prosecution and praise — or at the least, quiet nod of acceptance — seems to come down to whose goals the leak fulfills.  A key part of political reporting today leans on inside information from anonymous sources, and foreign policy reporting is practically impossible without regular bypassing of the carefully constructed filters the ones creating and/or carrying out said policy erect.  But to be generous, say hypothetically the description of what Manning is accused of as illegal with no qualifications whatsoever were settled:

• The persistence of leaks as sources for news, combined with the whole idea of leaking being about getting out inside information, drags in not just the leaker but anyone who moves the information from that point on.  Congratulations, you’ve just criminalized several media outlets.  If not, then answer my question, you’ve only had an entire year to think about it.
  
• The illegality as it focuses specifically on Manning…point being? It’s not as if were he to plead ignorance they’d take it seriously for even a moment.

The second part of the prosecution argument effectively boils down to “al-qaeda could read it!!”:

The prosecution showed an al Qaida video encouraging members to seek information about U.S. activities from places like WikiLeaks. It also referred to an article in al Qaida’s Inspire magazine — produced by the terror group’s propaganda arm — which referred to the leaks.

Most of what was leaked was past information, having largely squat to do with al-qaeda operations.  Fat lot of good it has done them anyway, considering how many of their high-ranking members have since purchased that farm they’ve had their eyes on.

By the way: the thing about propaganda that people get hung up on sometimes is that it isn’t unidirectional.  Knowing that they’re being tracked and that their magazine would find its way to desks in D.C., if they could keep up the fear on the cheap by exaggerating the worth of Wikileaks (and the spread of the material via mainstream media — again, consistency implies that those who’d see Julian Assange marched into a U.S. court would have to make room in that black SUV for Arthur Sulzberger II, among others) to themselves, why pass it up?

That said, even the defense has something stupid to say:

In addition to asserting there was no real damage done to U.S. security, the defense argued that Manning was a troubled man struggling with gender-identity issues, that the command structure in his unit failed him and that the information should not have been classified. (emphasis mine)

This isn’t the 50′s, you don’t get to toss off a claim that Gays Are Teh Crazy as if it’s nothing.  Sexual identity has as much to do with exposing the hypocrisy and tin-pot paranoia embedded in U.S. foreign policy as my hobby of homebrewing has to do with traffic in Johannesburg.

The outright insane provision in question was inserted by Senator Carl Levin, Democrat from Michigan.  Here’s how the Huffington Post reported that story at first:

 The Senate voted Tuesday to keep a controversial provision to let the military detain terrorism suspects on U.S. soil and hold them indefinitely without trial — prompting White House officials to reissue a veto threat.

The measure, part of the massive National Defense Authorization Act, was also opposed by civil libertarians on the left and right. But 16 Democrats and an independent joined with Republicans to defeat an amendment by Sen. Mark Udall (D-Colo.) that would have killed the provision, voting it down with 61 against, and 37 for it.

“I’m very, very, concerned about having U.S. citizens sent to Guantanamo Bay for indefinite detention,” said Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), one of the Senate’s most conservative members.

A threatened White House veto?  What, an actual response to ultimate entrenchment of the Unitary Executive principle and shredding of due process once and for all of “no”?  I know I haven’t been drinking that much, there’s a catch in here somewhere…

In defense of his endorsement of tyranny, Levin lets the cat out of the bag: the Obama Administration specifically requested the power he is attempting to hand them.  The veto threat was an empty toss towards a still-gullible base, now revealed to be a lie.  Might as well bring back the Sedition act while you’re at it, kick it real old school.

“Hey, this guy doesn’t have his license! Okay, Miguel, outta the f*cking car!“:

A German manager with Mercedes-Benz is free after being arrested for not having a driver’s license with him under Alabama’s new law targeting illegal immigrants, authorities said Friday, in an otherwise routine case that drew the attention of Gov. Robert Bentley.

Tuscaloosa Police Chief Steven Anderson told The Associated Press an officer stopped a rental vehicle for not having a tag Wednesday night and asked the driver for his license. The man only had a German identification card, so he was arrested and taken to police headquarters, Anderson said.

The 46-year-old executive was charged with violating the immigration law for not having proper identification, but he was released after an associate retrieved his passport, visa and German driver’s license from the hotel where he was staying, Anderson said.

“We are terribly sorry about that, Mr. Hager. Please, tell your associates back in Germany they are always welcome here.”

(a couple weeks pass)

“License, registration and papers! Habla Inglés, imbécil?“:

A second foreign auto worker has been stopped by authorities in Alabama, where the nation’s toughest immigration law recently went into effect, officials said on Wednesday.

A Honda worker on assignment at the company’s Lincoln, Alabama, factory was issued a citation.

The immigration law requires proper identification to be produced during routine traffic stops. People suspected of being in the country illegally can be detained.

“We understand he is working with authorities to resolve this matter,” said Ted Pratt, spokesman for Honda Manufacturing of Alabama. He described the worker as “a Japanese associate on assignment.”

“We understand, sir. This will be taken care of, no problem.  Have a nice day and drive safely.”

Shorter State Government of Alabama: “Dammit, this was supposed to just harass poor Mexicans, what the hell were we thinking?”

Notice how quickly enforcement ratcheted down once Detlev Hager got caught up in it?  They didn’t even arrest the guy from Japan!  That these stops are considered such embarrassments despite adhering to the letter of the law, based entirely on who just happened to drive into that spider web, shows the racial and class-based assumptions behind even passing the law in the first place: people with ties to the (now inaccurately named due to domestic production) import car industry that has bloomed in Alabama and other southern states largely because of their comparative success in crushing labor organization and offering big fat subsidies — a practice with deep and ironic roots in New Deal era Managerialism — are Not Intended Targets.  The German executive that runs across “papers, please” is a friendly fire incident, meanwhile Hispanic low-income workers…eh, who needs them?

The proper reason to reconsider such laws is the erasure of dignity inherent in them, by assuming anyone without papers is some kind of parasite — guilty until proven innocent.  Provided you are not violating the liberty of another person, there is no reason whatsoever for anyone to care why you are here or where you’re going, period.  Instead, Alabama is blushing because the legislation they aimed at these…

…misfired and hit Important People.

They even fail at realizing they failed.

(* – speaking of which: the bigoted corporate tool that authored that bill was recently recalled.  So much for pandering, huh?)

An illustration of what has happened since then:

The requirement for an official response was 5000.  Some variant of “legalize marijuana” beat that threshold nearly 20 times over.  The official response by Gil Kerlikowske, director of the Office of National Drug Control Policy, was the usual predictable pack of falsehoods, misdirections (example: the “weed is stronger these days!” stuff is actually a point in favor if you think about it, because then people use less) and nanny-statism, of course.

Take another look at the petitions page since then:

The one acknowledging the real purpose of this entire exercise as I explained has already shot past 5k.  In 3 days.  Click on it and you see the following:

Although the ability to submit petitions directly to the White House is a noble and welcome new feature of the current administration, the first round of responses makes blatantly clear the White House intends to just support its current stances and explain them with responses everyone who has done any research already knows.

An online petition is not meant as a replacement for using a search box in a web browser. We the People, those who grant you the power to govern in the first place, are requesting changes in policy directly, circumventing legislators who already do not listen to us. We the People request you govern FOR us, which means actually listening to us and actually acting in our interests instead of special interests.

You are not above us. You ARE us. Govern accordingly.

This being Halloween and all, I will reply to this while wearing a Zombie Herman Cain mask: “No, you’re wrong.  The general public is an apple, those who hold political power are oranges.  The ‘Government is Us’ rhetoric places apples in an orange basket.  Are your interests their interests?  Nein, nein, nein!”

Note: obviously they can’t just unilaterally legalize it.  That isn’t the issue.  The issue is that it is super obvious that even if they could, they wouldn’t, and if legislation reached the oval office desk that would do so, it would be vetoed, because the administration does not care what you think.

In a significant new blow to al-Qaeda, U.S. air strikes in Yemen on Sept. 30 killed Anwar al-Awlaki, an American militant cleric who became a prominent figure in the terrorist network’s most dangerous branch, using his fluent English and Internet savvy to draw recruits for attacks in the U.S.

The strike was the biggest U.S. success in hitting al-Qaeda’s leadership since the May killing of Osama bin Laden in Pakistan. But it raises questions that other strikes did not: al-Awlaki was an American citizen who had not been charged with any crime. Civil-liberties groups have questioned the government’s authority to kill an American without trial. (emphasis mine)

Like I said before, a law that only applies to nice folks isn’t a law, it’s a suggestion.  Was al-Awlaki at the least a religious nut?  Yes, he was.  Legally, that was entirely beside the point: the U.S. government, according to the law, is not to kill, or so much as even harm in a way intended to punish, a citizen without first having proven that they committed a crime.  To charge someone means to say you believe they did something and will attempt to prove it, yet no charge was brought up at all.  Doesn’t matter now, government is judge jury and executioner.

Even if regardless of the law you feel the world is simply better off without this guy, that isn’t the issue.  The issue is the authority being claimed, and who is next.  A hint already exists as to the 2nd part of that:

Predator drones firing on homes suspected of containing drugs might not be as far away as we think…

The management of Full Tilt Poker, the feds say, “operated Full Tilt Poker with the hope that only a small number of players would try to withdraw funds at any one time, and that Full Tilt Poker would regularly receive additional deposits in amounts greater than any withdrawal requests.”

Sound familiar to anyone?

According to the proposed complaint, when the U.S. government unsealed an indictment against [Full Tilt Poker CEO Ray] Bitar and effectively shut down Full Tilt’s U.S. operations in April, Full Tilt’s leaders realized they were facing a serious cash crunch but continued to accept foreign player funds while facing $300 million in liabilities. In June [board member] Lederer allegedly told others at Full Tilt that the company only had $6 million and Bitar worried in an internal email about a “run on the bank.” (emphasis mine)

Considering the legal dark-grey area that gambling — that is, other than state-run lotteries — occupies in most of the U.S., the interest on the part of government for the bottom to fall out is undeniable, even if the charge in the end is correct.  ”Look how risky online gambling is!  See why we keep trying to ban it, which has the side effect of increasing the risk?”

If only these guys had skipped open gambling altogether and gone into “investment” banking.  They’d be sitting on fresh scrilla from the Fed right now instead of indictments.

(* – through a loophole, they could advertise their “.net” sites, which were endorsed as free-to-play with the occasional tournament w/ prizes.  People who wanted the real thing simply switched the last part to “.com”.)

After 10 years of incarceration, and seven years after a jury sentenced him to die, 30-year-old Cory Maye will soon be going home. Mississippi Circuit Court Judge Prentiss Harrell signed a plea agreement Friday morning in which Maye pled guilty to manslaughter for the 2001 death of Prentiss, Mississippi, police officer Ron Jones, Jr.

Per the agreement, Harrell then sentenced Maye to 10 years in prison, time he has now already served. Maye will be taken to Rankin County, Mississippi, for processing and some procedural work. He is expected to be released within days.

It’s too bad that it requires the peal deal, since his actions were completely justified in the circumstances — he had no reason to expect the ones forcing their way into his home to be police, intending only self-defense.  True justice would’ve meant Cory Maye not only walked, but would have grounds to sue the local and state government officials involved in this.  But release is release, and it’s entirely understandable that, if all it takes to see the light of day again, after years of this injustice, is a “yeah, fine, blame me for your militaristic foolishness” it’d be an accepted tradeoff.

Now to prevent future Cory Mayes, by putting an end to this War on the poor, War on the black and brown, War on Freedom, called the “war on drugs”.

Well, that observation mattered a lot last weekend:

When New York became the sixth and by far the largest state to legalize same-sex marriage, following a grueling overtime session in the state Legislature Friday, it immediately transformed the national debate over the issue, legal experts said. [...]

“I think that having same-sex marriage in New York will have tremendous moral and political force for the rest of the country — in
part because New York is a large state, and in part because it hasn’t come easily,” said Suzanne Goldberg, a professor at Columbia Law School.

The New York Assembly passed same-sex marriage legislation twice before, in 2007 and 2009, but in both cases it stalled in the state Senate, as it nearly did again this week. The bill passed late Friday after legislators agreed on language allowing religious organizations to refuse to perform services or lend space for same-sex weddings. [emphasis mine]

To recap: a restatement of separation of church & state, which people against same-sex marriage actually oppose based on their rhetoric, that amounted to a fig leaf on a non-issue, was enough to greenlight the expansion of an example of how blurred that line already was, so that gays in New York can have their intimate, loving relationships recognized by the denizens of NY state’s requisite cubicle hives as a bunch of numbers and rubber stamps…

If contradictions were cocaine, this pile would be enough to remake Scarface twenty times.

On the simple civic matter, to have a range of privileges created on which it is said that group identity is a criteria to block people from them is plainly improper and should be stopped.  That something so obvious proves such a chore to do speaks volumes on state legitimacy and the lack thereof.  Culturally though, I can’t help but ponder what it means for us as affirmation of the deeply personal and a day at the DMV converge.

Surprised: someone at freakin’ National Review spoke somewhat positively about this.
Not surprised: their audience overwhelmingly cried foul.