Jacob Sullum from Creators Syndicate

Bogus Busts: New York City Continues Its Illegal Crackdown on Pot Smokers for 02/08/2012

Wed, 08 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Thirty-five years ago, New York's legislature decriminalized marijuana possession. Numbers released last week show the New York Police Department continues to flagrantly flout that policy, wasting resources on a pointless, unjust and illegal crusade against pot smokers.

Under the Marijuana Reform Act of 1977, possessing up to 25 grams of cannabis (about nine-tenths of an ounce) is a cita ...

Updated: Wed Feb 08, 2012

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Complexity Compounded for 02/01/2012

Wed, 01 Feb 2012 00:00:00 -0800

In his State of the Union address last week, President Obama used billionaire investor Warren Buffett's secretary, Debbie Bosanek, as a prop to illustrate the unfairness of our tax system. "Right now," he said as Bosanek sat near first lady Michelle Obama, "Warren Buffett pays a lower tax rate than his secretary."

Commentators spent the next week speculating about wha ...

Updated: Wed Feb 01, 2012

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GPS Tracking and Other New Surveillance Technologies Threaten Privacy for 01/25/2012

Wed, 25 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

"If you win this case," Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer told Deputy Solicitor General Michael Dreeben during oral argument in U.S. v. Jones last fall, "there is nothing to prevent the police or the government from monitoring 24 hours a day the public movement of every citizen of the United States." That prospect, Breyer said, "sounds like '1984.'"

Fortu ...

Updated: Wed Jan 25, 2012

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Misguided Efforts Gave Us the Pretense of 'Independent' Campaign Spending for 01/18/2012

Wed, 18 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

Winning Our Future, a "super PAC" that supports Newt Gingrich's bid for the Republican presidential nomination, is spending more than $1.2 million on ads in South Carolina, which holds its primary on Saturday. That fact requires some explanation.

First, why would anyone want Newt Gingrich to be president? Second, what is a super PAC? While the former question remains a mystery, ...

Updated: Wed Jan 18, 2012

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The Freakin' FCC: The Increasingly Incomprehensible Ban on Broadcast Indecency for 01/11/2012

Wed, 11 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

My daughters, who range in age from 5 to 18, watch TV programs and movies on DVDs, on smart phones, streaming from Netflix through our Wii, on video websites, on our DVR and on demand from AT&T U-verse. They do not know or care what "broadcast television" is, and they certainly do not perceive a categorical distinction between "over-the-air" channels and the rest.

Updated: Wed Jan 11, 2012

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The Loneliness of the Non-mainstream Swimmer for 01/04/2012

Wed, 04 Jan 2012 00:00:00 -0800

"I don't think Ron Paul represents the mainstream," says Mitt Romney. Newt Gingrich, another of the Texas congressman's opponents in the contest for the Republican presidential nomination, uses stronger terms, declaring, "Ron Paul's views are totally outside the mainstream of virtually every decent American."

As the results in Iowa suggest, the "mainstream" ...

Updated: Wed Jan 04, 2012

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'Things Happened': The Year's Highlights in Shifting Responsibility for 12/28/2011

Wed, 28 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

In an interview with the Christian Broadcasting Network last March, shortly before he announced that he was running for the Republican presidential nomination, Newt Gingrich reflected on his sins, which include cheating on his first two wives with women he would later marry. "At times of my life, partially driven by how passionately I felt about this country," he said, "I worked ...

Updated: Wed Dec 28, 2011

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One-Man Intervention: Ron Paul Challenges His Party's Mindless Militarism for 12/21/2011

Wed, 21 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Reporters routinely describe Ron Paul's foreign policy views as "isolationist" because he opposes the promiscuous use of military force. This is like calling him a recluse because he tries to avoid fistfights.

The implicit assumption that violence is the only way to interact with the world reflects the oddly circumscribed nature of foreign policy debates in mainstream American ...

Updated: Wed Dec 21, 2011

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If You're Looking for a Profligate Authoritarian, Gingrich Is Your Man for 12/14/2011

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

The first time Newt Gingrich disgusted me was in 1995, when the freshly installed speaker of the House proposed the death penalty for drug smugglers. Fifteen years later, I had a similar response when Gingrich demanded government action to stop Muslims from building a mosque near the site of the World Trade Center.

From the perspective of someone who wants to minimize the role of governm ...

Updated: Wed Dec 14, 2011

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Detention Pretension for 12/07/2011

Wed, 07 Dec 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Do you see a problem with a law that authorizes indefinite military detention of anyone the president identifies as an enemy of the state? For President Obama, the problem is clear: The law does not give him enough discretion.

Obama has threatened to veto the National Defense Authorization Act if the final version includes a provision approved by the Senate last week that requires milita ...

Updated: Wed Dec 07, 2011

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Romney's Immigration Dodge Precludes Possibility of Reconciling Policy With Reality for 11/30/2011

Wed, 30 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

"I don't believe in amnesty," Mitt Romney said in 2006, but "I don't believe in rounding up 11 million people and forcing them at gunpoint from our country." Although Romney is loath to admit it, the underlying reality remains the same.

While mass deportation of everyone illegally residing in the United States is unacceptable for both practical and humanitarian reason ...

Updated: Wed Nov 30, 2011

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Passing the Purse for 11/23/2011

Wed, 23 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Clearly what we need is a super-duper committee. Instead of six Republicans and six Democrats, it will have three members from each party, and its deficit reduction plan will go directly to the president for his signature, bypassing Congress entirely. This time for sure!

The recurrent fantasy that Congress can delegate difficult fiscal decisions to an autonomous body — whether a co ...

Updated: Wed Nov 23, 2011

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Upholding the Insurance Mandate Would Encourage Endless Meddling for 11/16/2011

Wed, 16 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

A couple of months ago, Deputy Assistant Attorney General Beth Brinkmann was standing before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit, defending the federal law requiring Americans to buy government-approved health insurance, when Judge Laurence Silberman asked her about broccoli. Specifically, he wanted to know whether a law requiring Americans to buy broccoli would exceed the federal g ...

Updated: Wed Nov 16, 2011

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Absolutely Profligate: Mitt Romney's Spending 'Cuts' Would Expand the Federal Budget for 11/09/2011

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0800

Presenting his fiscal plan in USA Today last week, Mitt Romney said he wants to "eliminate every government program that is not absolutely essential." That sounds good until you realize that Romney's goal of cutting $500 billion from projected federal outlays in 2016 would, at best, leave the budget about 8 percent higher than it is now and only 11 percent lower than it would be witho ...

Updated: Wed Nov 09, 2011

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File Not Found for 11/02/2011

Wed, 02 Nov 2011 00:00:00 -0700

When he took office, Barack Obama promised "an unprecedented level of openness in government." As a major part of that commitment, he pledged fidelity to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), which he called "the most prominent expression of a profound national commitment to ensuring an open government."

It is hard to reconcile these lofty memos with the Justice Dep ...

Updated: Wed Nov 02, 2011

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Perry and Gingrich Recklessly Disregard the Importance of Judicial Review for 10/26/2011

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Why is Newt Gingrich running for president? Two words: "under God."

I exaggerate only slightly. "One of the major reasons that I am running for president," the former House speaker said at this month's Value Voters Summit, "is the Ninrth Circuit Court decision in 2002 that 'one nation under God,' in the Pledge of Allegiance, was unconstitutional. That decision t ...

Updated: Wed Oct 26, 2011

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Borrowing From Paul for 10/19/2011

Wed, 19 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

Next month, the Joint Select Committee on Deficit Reduction, a 12-member subset of Congress that Congress created to make the hard fiscal choices Congress itself has failed to make, is expected to propose $1.2 trillion in cuts from projected spending during the next decade. This week, Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, who is seeking the Republican presidential nomination, unveiled a plan to cut nearly th ...

Updated: Wed Oct 19, 2011

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Read My Tea Leaves for 10/12/2011

Wed, 12 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

In their Oct. 7 press release announcing "coordinated enforcement actions" against medical marijuana dispensaries, California's four U.S. attorneys use the adjective "commercial" to describe their targets eight times and refer to "profit" nine times, not counting two mentions of "money" and one of "moneymaking." You might surmise from these clue ...

Updated: Wed Oct 12, 2011

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Runaway Missiles for 10/05/2011

Wed, 05 Oct 2011 00:00:00 -0700

After FBI agents took custody of Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the Nigerian charged with trying to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight on Dec. 25, 2009, they told him he had the right to remain silent. For Anwar al-Awlaki, the American-born cleric who allegedly helped plan Abdulmutallab's mission, that right was more like an obligation, enforced by Hellfire missiles fired at his car from remotely ...

Updated: Wed Oct 05, 2011

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Illinois Eavesdropping Act Shields Public Officials From Public Scrutiny for 09/28/2011

Wed, 28 Sep 2011 00:00:00 -0700

On Jan. 13, 2009, Michael Allison brought a digital recorder to the Crawford County Courthouse in Robinson, Ill., where he was contesting a citation, because he had been told there would be no official transcript of the proceedings. He was immediately confronted by Judge Kimbara Harrell, who accused him of violating her privacy and charged him with eavesdropping, a felony punishable by up to 15 ...

Updated: Wed Sep 28, 2011

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