Politics Daily http://www.politicsdaily.com Politics Daily http://www.blogsmithmedia.com/www.politicsdaily.com/media/feedlogo.gif Politics Daily http://www.politicsdaily.com en-us Copyright 2012 Weblogs, Inc. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/Democrats, Republicans, Independents Differ on Issues That Worry Them Mosthttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/21/democrats-republicans-independents-differ-on-the-issues-that-w/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/21/democrats-republicans-independents-differ-on-the-issues-that-w/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/21/democrats-republicans-independents-differ-on-the-issues-that-w/#commentsFiled under: , , , , , , , , , , , ,

The top five issues that Americans worry about the most would not surprise anyone -- the economy, federal spending and the deficit, availability and affordability of health care, unemployment and the Social Security system. But one polling snapshot zeroes in on the difference in emphasis that Republicans, Democrats and independents regard as the top issues.

For the overall population, 71 percent say they worry a great deal about the economy, 64 percent name federal spending and the deficit, 58 percent are concerned about health care, 57 percent fret about unemployment and 51 percent mention Social Security, according to a Gallup poll conducted March 3-6.

But looked at along party lines, federal spending tops the list for Republicans at 79 percent, with the economy a close second at 76 percent. The size and power of government is a major worry for 62 percent of Republicans, compared to 48 percent for the overall public. Illegal immigration is another issue higher on the list for Republicans (at 55 percent) than it is for the general public (42 percent).

Democrats put health care at the top of their list with 69 percent saying that's their top worry, followed by the economy at 64 percent, unemployment at 60 percent and Social Security at 53 percent.

Among independents, the order of concerns is: the economy (72 percent), federal spending (65 percent), health care (58 percent) and unemployment (55 percent).

The issue Americans worry about least is race relations, which only 16 percent call a top worry, with the environment second to last at 34 percent. In between, for the public at large, is availability and affordability of energy (46 percent), crime and violence (44 percent), illegal immigration (42 percent), hunger and homelessness (41 percent), possibility of a terrorist attack in the U.S. (40 percent) and drug use (40 percent).

Health care did not break into the ranks of top concerns for Republicans, and a Kaiser Family Foundation poll, conducted March 8-13, shows that it continues to be a polarizing issues, with Republicans strongly opposed to the year-old reform measure and Democrats strongly in support.





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]]>dailyguidanceBruce Drake2011-03-21T11:51:00+00:00Race, Crime and Justice: It Was Never Just About Henry Louis Gateshttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/12/race-crime-and-justice-it-was-never-just-about-henry-louis-gat/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/12/race-crime-and-justice-it-was-never-just-about-henry-louis-gat/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/12/race-crime-and-justice-it-was-never-just-about-henry-louis-gat/#commentsFiled under: , , , , ,

The summer of 2009. It was that long ago when the arrest of an African American scholar at his home by a white police officer in Cambridge, Mass., had the country choosing sides and a president convening a beer summit at the White House to cool things down.

What most remember as a political spat that ensnared Harvard University's Henry Louis Gates, Sgt. James Crowley and President Barack Obama didn't start or end that summer. When Harvard Law professor Charles Ogletree -- Gates' lawyer and friend -- visited Charlotte, N.C., recently, it wasn't just to sign copies of "The Presumption of Guilt: The Arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Race, Class and Crime in America," his book published last summer.

It was also to seek remedies for an issue so raw that it was barely touched on by the time a photo-op -- with the president, Vice President Joe Biden, Gates, Crowley and smiles all around -- took the story out of the headlines.

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The point isn't that high-status black men have it tough in America -- though the book ends with a long list of PhDs, lawyers, and doctors who were pulled over and frisked, arrested or had a gun drawn on them because they "fit the description" or were thought out of place in a certain neighborhood, often their own.

Gates was arrested while Crowley was investigating a possible break-in at the professor's home. "It's a surprise to the world that a prominent Harvard University professor would be arrested in his own house," Ogletree told me. "But it says more about the broader issue that Gates is the one who has a lawyer -- me -- who has resources, who can get a positive result, and that's not the case for most people in America who are black or brown and poor.

"It reminds us that we can't focus on Gates as a success if ... women and men, black and brown, around the country can't find the same kind of justice." The answer is "to find a kind of system that's more just and more respectful of individuals."

It was the president's sentiment that the Cambridge police "acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own house" that made headlines and launched debate on whether he should have said anything at all. Lost were his comments on racial profiling and a bill he worked on in the Illinois legislature.

"That doesn't lessen the incredible progress that has been made. I am standing here as testimony," he said. "And yet, the fact of the matter is . . . this still haunts us. And even when there are honest misunderstandings, the fact that blacks and Hispanics are picked up more frequently and often time for no cause casts suspicion even when there is good cause, and that's why I think the more that we're working with local law enforcement to improve policing techniques so that we're eliminating potential bias, the safer everybody's going to be."

In a program at the Charlotte School of Law, sponsored by the school, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Community Relations Committee, the Mecklenburg County Bar and the Community Building Initiative, Ogletree moderated a panel on the realities of race and justice in America and his belief that "in America today, race trumps class."

A police chief, district attorney, activists and lawyers who defend clients without the profile of a "Skip" Gates agreed with Obama and Ogletree that it's an essential conversation. This one took place in a city often touted as a New South model, the site of the 2012 Democratic National Convention, which will place Charlotte in an international spotlight. It's a city with a majority white population and an African-American mayor and police chief, but one where disagreements about which schools and libraries should close to balance county budgets have raised issues of race, class and privilege.

Mayor Anthony Foxx listened as Chief Rodney Monroe said that effective policing puts emphasis should "on conduct, not one's race or certain acts that people attribute to race." Mecklenburg County District Attorney Andrew Murray, elected in November, said he is reaching out to civic organizations so his office can better work with community members. "Race should never be a factor" when enforcing the law, he said.

As panelists pointed out, the U.S. prison population has grown from fewer than 500,000 in the late 1970s and early 1980s to more than 2 million today, with much of the increase caused by the war on drugs. Minorities are disproportionately affected, though drug usage crosses all communities.

The country is "suffering from the over-criminalization of society and the racialization of crime," said longtime civil rights attorney James Ferguson. "When people think of crime, they think black, and increasingly Latino." Adriana Taylor of the Latin American Coalition said there are differences in the law and how it's enforced.

A police record can tag a person and follow him everywhere, preventing him from voting and getting a job or a bank loan, alienating him from society. Public defender Kevin Tully said he reminds his young minority clients of what's at stake when they insist on their right to wear a certain hairstyle or outfit to court. The people who will be judging them "watch a lot of TV," Tully tells them, where "this is what the bad guys look like." Lenny Springs, an education official with the Obama administration, said that "the television and motion-picture industry needs to take a look at themselves."

Three seniors from predominantly black West Charlotte High School -- including the class' top-ranked student who is headed to Wake Forest University -- sat in the audience as rebuke to the stereotype they said they have to face every day.

After the discussion, I had a chance to talk with Ogletree, whose seminar I took when I spent an academic year at Harvard as a Nieman Fellow. The police, he said, need help, too. "We put too much pressure on police to solve all of our problems," and "many of them have nothing to do with law enforcement."

"I think about the senior citizen in Roxbury [a black neighborhood in Boston] who sees some young black men with baggy pants pass outside her apartment building, and she knows they don't have drugs or guns, but she doesn't want to walk through them."

"She calls the police, they'll come, they'll make those young men get on the ground and they'll search them." They won't find anything and the men are upset because they didn't commit a crime, he said. "That's how we misuse the police sometimes." He said police departments don't have the training, or as much diversity, as they should have.

"Give them the resources to do prevention," Ogletree said, "get on the streets and get out of the car and make sure the community knows you're there not to just arrest but to really protect and to serve."

"That needs to be a transformative aspect of law enforcement," he said, and it's something he's optimistic will happen sometime in the 21st century. "I've been talking to police chiefs around the country, and they're saying we need to be smarter on crime and not just tougher."

"We can focus on the dangerous people in the community, and not just stop everybody that we think might be involved in crimes," Ogletree said. "It makes everybody safer."

But the community also has to be involved, not just by cooperating with police but by doing its part to keep neighborhoods clean and safe, he said. "Pick up that trash, don't double-park here, don't leave your child at home."

As Charlotte prepares for 2012, it is trying to become known as something more than just a place for a party. The city is tackling issues of equity, access and inclusion, even if, as Springs said, "Charles Ogletree of Harvard University has to come down to get this forum to talk about it."


Click here to follow Mary C. Curtis on Twitter.

 

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]]>beer summitcharles ogletreeharvard universityhenry louis gates jr.Mary C. Curtis2011-03-12T22:00:00+00:00Lara Logan Assault: Why Female Foreign Correspondents Need Self-Defense Skillshttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/12/ready-the-lara-logan-assault-and-why-female-foreign-correspo/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/12/ready-the-lara-logan-assault-and-why-female-foreign-correspo/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/12/ready-the-lara-logan-assault-and-why-female-foreign-correspo/#commentsFiled under: , , ,

How does a woman acquire the trademarked name "Dr. Ruthless"?

If you're Melissa Soalt, aka "Dr. Ruthless," you preach the gospel of low-down, dirty, eye-gouging, groin-crushing, go-for-the-throat self-defense tactics for women. You also take your 26 years of martial arts training -- Soalt is in the Black Belt Hall of Fame -- and combine it with your insights as a former psychotherapist. You come up with a potent message to women that constant fear is a crippler, and that you can learn how to fight like a warrior -- or a mad dog -- always keeping in mind that fleeing, if possible, is your best defense.

Recently, Soalt joined an online discussion at Politics Daily about the attack on CBS reporter Lara Logan in Egypt. Soalt questions why female foreign correspondents don't routinely get self-defense training. She sent us her thoughts, and we followed up later with a call to her home in Massachusetts.

Why did Lara Logan's attack touch such a nerve?

Journalists tell stories the world might otherwise never hear. They also speak for people who sometimes cannot speak for themselves, usually out of fear. And sometimes the journalist, the storyteller, becomes the story. That was the case with Lara Logan.

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Her assault and beating in Cairo's Tahrir Square sent shock waves through the journalistic community. Not only because it was a rapacious attack by a mob of men, but upon returning home she was re-attacked by loutish commentators and keyboard cretins who took some twisted pleasure in castigating her as the ballsy blonde, the warmongering reporter with a "hotness factor." In other words: she had it coming. Wanted it.

They should choke on a chicken bone.

What still haunts me is the picture of Ms. Logan's face, taken shortly before the attack. . . . It captures something uniquely female, a vulnerability -- and it speaks to every woman's unspoken fears of becoming prey. It's a sickening reality: That in our 21st century, the taking and violating of the female body remains pandemic. You see it in the devastated face of a rape victim in the Congo. Or the face of the NYC woman who was beaten to a pulp in a restroom stall; or the numbed-out face of a Cambodian girl forced into sexual slavery.

These are all haunting images that we typically watch from the comfort of our sofas; they are the stories that journalists and women reporters go after -- then find themselves in places where lawlessness and armed men are plentiful -- and nice toilets, not so much.

We need to protect journalists so they can tell the stories the world might otherwise never read or hear.

And those who say Lara Logan's experience just proves why women journalists should not be on the front lines?

That would not only be a backward step for women, but it's not an effective solution. The better remedy, along with tightened security, is not to block women from assignments but to prep them to be battle-ready. Female journalists must learn to become self-defending dames! Prepping women with self-protection strategies would seem a no-brainer, yet this is nowhere to be found in "hostile environment" training. (The exception being the BBC, which offers safety training to women by women.)

Judith Matloff, a veteran correspondent of war zones, addressed the huge issue of sex assaults on female journalists in a Columbia Journalism Review article, "Unspoken: Foreign Correspondents and Sexual Assault."

Here's a quote: "Women have risen to the top of war and foreign reportage. They run bureaus in dodgy places and do jobs that are just as dangerous as those that men do. But there is one area where they differ from the boys -- sexual harassment and rape. Female reporters are targets in places where guns are common and punishment rare. . . . War zones in particular seem to invite unwanted advances, and sometimes the creeps can be the drivers, guards, and even the sources that one depends on to do the job. "

The risk of sex assault is corroborated in a survey in the International News Safety Institute (INSI). It's a slim survey, albeit, but a whopping half of its respondents "reported sexual harassment and a significant number said they experienced sexual abuse."

The other part of this is the "don't ask, don't tell" element. Matloff describes how female journalists don't talk about the assaults they endure for fear of losing assignments or being seen as wimps. Women have to get past that.

So your solution is a crash course in self-defense for women journalists?

Call it civil duty, but I feel called to the task. I'm going on record to let media and journalism outfits know that I want to help. Seriously -- call me!

Let me back up. I'm not a journalist. I'm a women's self-defense expert and advocate of 26 years. [By the way, I'm five feet tall on a good hair day.] I talk about fight-back self-defense -- but as a last resort on the continuum of strategies. I unabashedly advocate that ALL women uncover and train their capacities for aggressive self-protection. Not only is it imperative to female safety and well-being, but it also counters the ills and indignities imposed by fear.

Returning to Logan's experience -- you've said you have no details of what happened to her that day in Tahrir Square -- but can you talk in general about recovering from a sexual assault?

The truth is some women never recover. I'm hoping and assuming that Ms. Logan will get therapeutic treatment, but it takes time, and the residue from the trauma lingers. In fact, it embeds itself in your body tissue, in your neural network. . . .

Rape boasts a high incidence of PTSD, but as it turns out, having fight-back skills can make a huge difference in the aftermath -- regardless of outcome. Judith Herman, M.D., writes in "Trauma & Recovery" that women who fight back are not only more likely to be successful in thwarting the rape attempt, but less likely to suffer severe distress symptoms. On the other hand, women who submitted without a struggle were more likely to be highly self-critical and depressed in the aftermath.

This alone is plenty good reason to learn how to fight like a junkyard bitch.

That is not to suggest that Lara Logan could have done something to remedy her overwhelming situation -- of course not. But simply that women need to be armed with practical skills to handle a variety of what if scenarios specific to the sexual assault, harassment and hostilities that women journalists are most likely to face.

You were attacked in Boulder, Colo., in the 1980s.

Yes, I know what it's like to be scared to death, to be awakened in the night by a knife-wielding intruder and to hear these words scream in your head: "Now I am going to die . . . Now I am going to be raped to death." I heard his footsteps creaking on the floorboards -- not the footsteps of my then-fiance -- and saw him, maybe 10 feet away with knife in hand, approaching my bed. I sat up and unleashed blood-curdling yells and screams. My "war cries" sent him fleeing out the door, rather than closing the distance on me.

In my youth, I also did quite a bit of traveling as a "hippie voyager." I've been assaulted and have successfully bashed back, freeing myself from would-be rapists and a couple of street thugs in Israel, India, Pakistan and Italy. Places steeped in patriarchal rule where ownership and "taking" have historically been the privileges of men, where women routinely suck up indignities -- gropes and grabs, some fleeting like skaters on ice, other more stinging like hit-and-run thieves in the night.

But that pales by comparison to the panic of being trapped in a mob. It happened to me one day in Peshawar (1975) while walking a fellow traveler's St. Bernard. When we came to rest at a street corner, which was unremarkable at first, a group of maybe 30 or so men swooped in around us with the velocity of a thunderclap. The dog and I were stoned with rocks. When that first crush of terror hit and took my breath away, I instinctively crushed back. Somehow I managed to crash and bang my way out through the weak link in the chain -- a tactic I would later come to know as "entering," as "charging" an enemy when the only way out is through. We ran like the dickens, bruised but not broken.

What would you teach woman journalists?

Well, I could show you how to kill a man with a pen -- preferably a good, solid, titanium ballpoint pen -- how to drive it into the soft tissue of the throat, or the groin, or even the eye. The key is remembering your hips are your center of power.

Here is what journalists under my tutelage would be packing, along with notebooks and very good shoes: The mindset of a Marine, the heart of a lioness, and the essential knowledge of a security director.

And here is a sampling of the curriculum:

  • Practical Prevention Strategies -- including danger recognition and situational awareness to detect precursors to attack and predation; security measures for hotels, marketplace and crowds, including critical scanning, how to amplify your senses, develop early motion detection, and avoid the dreaded mistake of visual fixation.
  • How to set and defend boundaries and rebuff unwanted advances, including essential body positioning and distance-controlling methods. Female journalists driven by empathy and a desire to get the story are often eager to lend a helping hand. Need to thicken the skin. New motto: "Tempering compassion with a ruthless attention to reality."
  • Emergency fight-back methods and essential principles of fighting in close quarters. How and why to exploit surprise.
  • How to use your environment to your advantage and wield "weapons of opportunity" to facilitate escape. (Sorry, ladies, you can't just give a spritz of hair spray into a would-be assailant's face and expect a pumped up, larger creature to plop at your feet. Fat chance. Here's how you do it . . . a combo platter of doings. )
  • Critical lessons for harnessing the powerful "survival charge" of fear and adrenaline and mitigating its potentially disabling effects; how to manage the "emotional body," maintain focus and control and not freeze or flail under the stress of attack. Understanding this nugget of wisdom: The first few seconds are critical!

I talk about several of these principles at my website, www.dr-ruthless.com.

 

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]]>Foreign correspondentsjudith matloffLara LoganMartial artsSexual assaulttahrir squareTDWomens self-defenseMary Winter2011-03-12T22:00:00+00:0021 Priests in Philadelphia Suspended on Sex Abuse Allegationshttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/08/21-priests-in-philadelphia-suspended-on-sex-abuse-allegations/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/08/21-priests-in-philadelphia-suspended-on-sex-abuse-allegations/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/08/21-priests-in-philadelphia-suspended-on-sex-abuse-allegations/#commentsFiled under: , , , ,

Cardinal Justin Rigali of Philadelphia on Tuesday placed 21 priests on administrative leave following a damning grand jury report last month -- the second investigation of sex abuse by priests in recent years -- that said up to 37 clerics suspected of abuse remained in ministry.

Rigali suspended the priests on the eve of Ash Wednesday and the penitential season of Lent. In a statement, Rigali expressed his "sorrow" for the abuse of children by clergy.

"I am truly sorry for the harm done to the victims of sexual abuse, as well as to the members of our community who suffer as a result of this great evil and crime," Rigali said.

The grand jury charged three priests and a parochial school teacher with raping and assaulting boys in their care, while a former official with the Philadelphia Archdiocese was accused of allowing the abusive priests to have access to children. Most of the cases were beyond the statute of limitations and could not be prosecuted.

Several of the 37 priests cited by the grand jury had been suspended from ministry before Tuesday's action or were incapacitated and have not been in active ministry, the archdiocese said. Two other priests no longer serve in the Archdiocese of Philadelphia and are members of religious orders, whose leaders have been notified of the accusations.

Eight priests cited by the grand jury were cleared by an independent examination, the archdiocese said.

The revelations have rocked the Catholic Church in Philadelphia and threaten to reopen the abuse scandal that the U.S. hierarchy has tried to put behind it.

Shortly after the grand jury report was released, Rigali hired Gina Maisto Smith, a former Philadelphia assistant district attorney who has prosecuted child sexual assault cases for nearly two decades, to lead a review of the 37 cases.

"I was given the unlimited freedom to do a thorough review with full access to all files and documents," Smith said in the statement.

She will now lead a team that includes a "nationally renowned pediatrician" in the field of child abuse, a forensic psychiatrist and psychologist, an expert from the child advocacy community and other experts in investigating the remaining cases more fully.

"These administrative leaves are interim measures," Rigali stressed. "They are not in any way final determinations or judgments."

Tuesday's action was one of the most sweeping in the decade since widespread revelations of child sexual abuse by clergy began battering the Catholic Church, and they indicate that the church is still in the midst of what has been called the "Long Lent" of American Catholicism.

 

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]]>CardinalJustinRigaliCatholic sexual abuse scandalgrand juryGrandJuryPhiladelphiaphiladelphia archdiocesepriests suspendedDavid Gibson2011-03-08T18:32:00+00:00Supreme Court Clears Path Toward Post-Conviction DNA Testinghttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/07/supreme-court-clears-path-toward-post-conviction-dna-testing/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/07/supreme-court-clears-path-toward-post-conviction-dna-testing/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/07/supreme-court-clears-path-toward-post-conviction-dna-testing/#commentsFiled under: ,

The United States Supreme Court Monday made it easier for convicted prisoners to seek and obtain post-trial DNA testing even over the objections of law enforcement officials.

In a 6-3 ruling authored by Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg, the Court ruled that death row inmate Henry Skinner could now proceed to seek crime-scene testing from Texas authorities under the federal civil rights law known as "Section 1983."

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Skinner was convicted in 1995 of murdering his girlfriend, Twila Busby, and her two children. At his trial, Skinner said he was too incapacitated by drugs and alcohol to have committed the crimes and he identified Busby's uncle as the perpetrator. There was blood and fingerprint testing done at the scene of the crime but no DNA testing before trial. In 2001, six years after Skinner's trial, Texas passed a law allowing prisoners to seek post-conviction DNA in some cases. Twice Skinner tried to invoke the Texas law to get additional testing done. Twice the state courts shot him down.

Skinner took his cause to federal court and was hours away from being executed by lethal injection last March when the Supreme Court stepped in to halt the proceedings under way at the Texas state prison in Huntsville. By that time, Skinner's cause had become an international one, largely because of the work performed by members of the Medill Innocence Project at Northwestern University, which sends out teams of undergraduate investigators to look into claims of wrongdoing within the criminal justice system. When Medill investigators looked into the Skinner case, starting in 2000, they found significant problems with some of the evidence Skinner's jurors had heard at trial.

In Skinner v. Switzer, Justice Ginsburg ruled that Skinner was entitled to press state officials for testing under Section 1983 in part because "success in his suit for DNA testing would not 'necessarily imply' the invalidity of his conviction. While test results might prove exculpatory, that outcome is hardly inevitable... results might prove inconclusive or they might further incriminate Skinner." Justice Ginsburg rejected the argument made by Texas' lawyers that allowing such claims everywhere under the federal law would generate a new flood of prisoner litigation. "In the Circuits that currently allow §1983 claims for DNA testing," she wrote, no evidence tendered by Switzer shows any litigation flood or even rainfall."

The Court's order does not guarantee that Skinner will be able to have DNA testing conducted of evidence taken from the crime scene. But it allows Skinner's defense attorneys to take a direct legal route in asking the federal courts to intercede on Skinner's behalf with Texas officials, including state court judges, who so far have refused to authorize such testing. The Court's ruling also ensures that Skinner's execution date will remain in limbo for perhaps as many as two more years -- even if he ultimately loses his new attempt to have DNA testing done.

In dissent, Justice Clarence Thomas, writing for himself and Justices Samuel Alito and Anthony Kennedy, wrote that the majority's opinion was not warranted by Court precedent and inappropriately gave convicted prisoners like Skinner what Justice Thomas called "a road map" to challenge their state court proceedings. "What prisoner would not avail himself of this additional bite at the apple," he said.

One of Skinner's attorneys, Robert C. Owen, said in the wake of the ruling: "The Court's action corrects the Fifth Circuit's fundamental misunderstanding of this important principle. As Justice Ginsburg states in her majority opinion, there is no reason to fear that lawsuits like Mr. Skinner's will overwhelm the federal courts. The high court's ruling will simply make it possible for Mr. Skinner to vindicate his due process rights in federal court, a right long enjoyed by prisoners in other parts of the country. We look forward to making our case in federal court that Texas's inexplicable refusal to grant Mr. Skinner access to evidence for DNA testing is fundamentally unfair and cannot stand."

Texas state attorneys did not immediately comment. Nina Morrison, a staff attorney with the Innocence Project, issued this statement: "Mr. Skinner has been fighting for 10 years for access to evidence so that he could conduct DNA testing that could prove his innocence.... we hope that the district attorney will end further delay and consent to the testing."

 

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]]>civil rightsHank SkinnerHenry SkinnerJustice Clarence ThomasJustice Ruth Bader GinsburgMedill Innocence ProjectNorthwestern UniversitySkinner v. SpitzerTexas death rowTexas justice systemUnited States Supreme CourtAndrew Cohen2011-03-07T14:15:00+00:00Jared Lee Loughner Case: Feds Add Murder Charges, Potential Death Penaltyhttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/04/jared-lee-loughner-case-feds-add-murder-charges-potential-deat/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/04/jared-lee-loughner-case-feds-add-murder-charges-potential-deat/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/03/04/jared-lee-loughner-case-feds-add-murder-charges-potential-deat/#commentsFiled under: , , ,

The federal government's case against Jared Lee Loughner got bigger and more serious Friday after a grand jury returned a new, 49-count indictment charging the Tucson, Ariz., shooting suspect with multiple first-degree murder charges for his alleged role in the deadly Jan. 10 attack. A new arraignment in the case is set for March 9.

Six people, including Arizona Chief District Judge John M. Roll, were killed, and 14 others, including Rep. Gabrielle Gifford (D-Ariz.), were wounded when Loughner, 22, allegedly began shooting a semi-automatic weapon inside a supermarket during one of Rep. Giffords' public meetings in the Tucson area. The incident was reportedly recorded on store videotape. Loughner was arrested at the scene after he was tackled by bystanders.

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The two federal murder charges contained in the superseding indictment make Loughner eligible for the death penalty if he is convicted. However, under longstanding Justice Department guidelines, Attorney General Eric Holder still must determine whether federal prosecutors intend to seek capital punishment for the man they say killed Judge Roll and Gabriel M. Zimmerman, one of the members of Rep. Giffords' staff. Federal officials said Friday that they were in the process of undertaking that review. There are currently 60 prisoners on federal death row, according to the Death Penalty Information Center.

A statement from the U.S. Attorney's Office in Arizona, issued in connection with the public release of the new indictment, read: "The deceased are not the only ones whose rights are being defended. Those citizens who were peaceably assembled to speak to their Member of Congress are also named as victims in the indictment." There was no immediate word from Loughner's attorneys. Loughner remains in federal custody in Tucson.

The federal grand jury also added new charges against Loughner relating to the deaths of the four other people slain in the attack who were not federal employees. Loughner is charged also with attempting to murder Rep. Giffords, who was shot in the head and who is now undergoing rehabilitation in Houston. The initial federal indictment against Loughner, handed up on Jan. 19, included only attempted murder charges.

Loughner's arraignment next week in Tucson will be presided over by U.S. District Judge Larry Burns, who normally presides in San Diego. Judge Burns was selected to handle the case after all of Arizona's federal trial judges recused themselves from the case because of the death of Judge Roll. Loughner is represented by Judith Clarke, a veteran defense attorney whose former clients include the Unabomber, Theodore Kaczynski, and Zacarias Moussaoui, the terror conspirator involved in the 9/11 attacks.

The scope of the new indictment assures that state charges against Loughner will be delayed pending the resolution of the federal case. Officials with the Pima County Attorney's Office, which has local jurisidiction over the case, have promised to pursue such charges.

 

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]]>Chief U.S. District Judge John M. RollJared Lee LoughnerRep. Gabrielle Giffordstucson shootingUnited States Supreme CourtAndrew Cohen2011-03-04T15:40:00+00:00Happy 100th Birthday to the 1911 .45 Pistol, Our Gun of Choicehttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/27/happy-100th-birthday-to-the-45-pistol-our-gun-of-choice/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/27/happy-100th-birthday-to-the-45-pistol-our-gun-of-choice/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/27/happy-100th-birthday-to-the-45-pistol-our-gun-of-choice/#commentsFiled under: , ,

This year marks the 100th "birthday" of one of America's most successful and culturally impactive political tools: the 1911 .45 semi-automatic pistol.

Yet this is not just a story about a gun.

Though, of course, this story stars and starts with that gun.

Or rather, our need for it that emerged when U.S. armed forces fought Muslim insurgents on Asian turf that most Americans have trouble finding on a map.

As most of us remember -- especially fans of Mark Twain and Rudyard Kipling -- from 1899-1913, the United States fought the Philippine-American War for control of those Pacific islands. In that conflict that killed 4,165 Americans, our Army battled Moro guerrillas -- fervent Muslims who charged our troops and often failed to be dropped by our soldiers' .38-caliber revolvers. The Army went looking for a handgun that would help keep our guys from getting hacked up in close-quarter combat.

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Enter John Browning and Colt firearms. For Uncle Sam's competitive procurement process, Browning designed a Colt semi-automatic pistol that with individual squeezes of its trigger could fire seven rounds of the .45-caliber bullet -- almost a half-inch-wide slug of lead -- then be quickly reloaded by slapping a cartridge-filled magazine ("clip") into the handle. With its two safeties and ergonomic design, Browning's pistol beat all competitors, firing 6,000 rounds with no malfunctions. In 1911, the Army adopted Browning's .45 as its handgun.

And from our dusty Mexican desert horse cavalry campaigns against Pancho Villa, through both World Wars, in the snows of Korea and the jungles of Vietnam, right up to today's use by our Delta Force commandos (even though since 1985 it's not been "standard issue" for our military), the 1911 has been a ubiquitous tool for -- to paraphrase Prussian general Carl von Clausewitz -- carrying out politics by other means.

Probably only two other American military devices have lasted so long and seen such wide use: the .50-caliber heavy machine gun birthed in WWI and still echoing through the hills of Afghanistan, and the still flying B-52 bomber built for our Cold War strategy of Mutual Assured Destruction but used in Vietnam and other conflicts to rain non-nuclear bombs.

No other tangible American political tool has gone so global.

Politics Daily's military reporter David Wood saw a Somali irregular officer atop a confiscated UNICEF ambulance in 1977's Ogaden War wearing a holstered 1911 strapped across his bare chest "like the heavyweight crown of the world," a symbol of authority and rank. A former Marine turned CIA street operative told Politics Daily that "only the Kalashnikov" (the Soviet-originated machine gun often known as the AK-47) is as common in global hotspots. Foreign governments use 1911's for their forces and 1911's are carried by many U.S. cops, including Los Angeles's SWAT units. A D.C. homicide detective who worked an elite anti-narcotics squad similar to that on the HBO show "The Wire" (warning: explicit dialog in hyperlink) customized a 1911 as his off-duty weapon. And this year, the Utah Legislature is poised to honor the 1911 by designating it as the official state gun.

The 1911 shot a hot trajectory through our imaginative culture.

That gun is in a jillion World War movies. What other pistol would dare fill the fist of Marine Corps Sgt. John Stryker (aka John Wayne) in "The Sands of Iwo Jima"? As movies discovered gangsters between the two World Wars, the 1911 became as much a Hollywood star as the Thompson submachine gun. American prose-slingers hankering for high impact riddled their stories with 1911's -- especially Mickey Spillane, who sold 225 million novels. What modern crime writer Max Allan Collins calls Spillane's "fever dream prose" waxed poetic about the size and intimidating power of the 1911 so often that his fictions vindicate Sigmund Freud.

As America hit the 1960's heeding that one-word advice given Dustin Hoffman in "The Graduate" - "plastics" - space-age, sleek new handguns in fiction and real life eclipsed the 1911, as Bruce Willis articulates in "Die Hard 2." But the 1911 never surrendered, making key appearances in movies like (Disclosure: from my novel) "Three Days of the Condor," Robert De Niro's "Ronin," and even "Animal House." The 1911 has its own web fan sites and the National Rifle Association museum near Washington, D.C.'s Beltway is planning an exhibit to honor the gun's centennial.

How Colt lost control of its 1911 franchise is a fascinating business story, but not what we're aiming at here, just as we're not looking to stand on any of the dozen sides in our political wars over gun regulations.

Nor is our target modifications of the 1911 over its first 100 years. Such critiques are better left to gun masters such as Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and renowned novelist Stephen Hunter.

Hunter generously let Politics Daily zero the heart shot of any 1911 story: What's it like to shoot one?

With the help of Rick Alexander and Ed DeCarlo at On Target's indoor shooting range, Hunter led Politics Daily contributors Alison Fairbrother -- who'd never fired any gun -- Nathan Grady, and me through a shooting session with a selection of 1911's. We donned eye and ear protectors, stepped to the firing line, raised Hunter's 1911's . . .

And blasted holes through paper targets. Felt the whunk from the booming recoil as 1911's jumped in our two-handed grips. Saw the flash, smelled the powder and hot brass. Thanks to Politics Daily's Colin McDonald and Loki Films' Christina Gonzalez, this story's video insert of our adventure captures Hunter's wit and zen wisdom -- "Lean forward into it [the gun]. You dominate it, it doesn't dominate you . . ." -- as we fire one of history's most efficient death-dealing machines:


That's what the 1911 is about: Death. Or life.

That's the choice you make when you pick up a 1911 (always presume all guns are loaded). You pick up the 1911, you make some moral decision to enforce your will with life or death choices.

No matter how else we label that choice, it's politics: the 1911 is built to shoot someone else, and such an element of control is the essence of politics.

Just as the samurai sword says something about the character of medieval Japanese culture and politics, the 1911 says something about our America.

The 1911 is big and heavy and loud and lethal.

It's a triumph of necessity, simplicity, and innovation.

Most of all, it works.

As a CIA senior operations officer told Politics Daily, if you hit something with a 1911, "You knock it down."

And that's where the most ironic and powerful political truths of the 1911 emerge: gripping it does not make you right, virtuous or victorious. Past, present and future, those elements are decided by human factors stumbling through our political world.

What does that mean? Where does that leave us?

So much depends on who's holding what gun.

But that's only one place our fate starts - 100 years ago, 100 years from now, today.

 

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]]>.50 caliber heavy machinegun1911 .451911 Colt .45 pistol1911+handgun+birthday1911+pistol1911handgunbirthday1911pistolak-47Alison Fairbrotheranimal houseB-52B-52Bombersbob dylanbruce willisCarl von ClausewitzCentral intelligence agencyCIAclausewitzcold warcolin mcdonaldColt firearmscolt+1911colt1911David WoodDelta ForceDie Hard 2dr. strangeloveDustin Hoffmangraham greenegunshbohuman factorsJames GradyJohn BrowningJohn WayneKalashnikovKorean WarLAPDLoki Filmslos angeles police departmentMarine CorpsMark Twainmax allan collinsMickey SpillaneMutual Assured DestructionNathan GradyNational Rifle AssociationNRANRA museumOgaden WarOn TargetPancho VillaPhilippine-American Warpolitical worldPulitzer Prizerobert de niroRoninrudyard kiplingsamurai swordSigmund FreudStephen HunterSWATthe graduateThe Red WheelbarrowThe Sands Of Iowa Jimathe wireThompson submachinegunThree Days of the CondorVietnam Warwilliam carlos williamsworld warworld war iworld war IIWW IWW IIzenJames Grady2011-02-27T22:00:00+00:00Pro-Choice Extremist Reportedly Arrested by FBI for Threats to Pro-Life Activistshttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/26/pro-choice-extremist-reportedly-arrested-by-fbi-for-threats-to-p/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/26/pro-choice-extremist-reportedly-arrested-by-fbi-for-threats-to-p/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/26/pro-choice-extremist-reportedly-arrested-by-fbi-for-threats-to-p/#commentsFiled under: , , , , ,

The FBI in New York has reportedly arrested Theodore Shulman, a radical abortion rights campaigner with a long history of threatening pro-life activists, and charged him with making interstate threats against two abortion opponents who were not identified.

The 49-year-old Shulman was arrested on Thursday and was being held without bond at the Metropolitan Correctional Center in New York City, according to pro-life activists who were alerted to Shulman's incarceration by federal investigators. An officer at the correctional center referred a calls about inmates to the public relations office, which is closed over the weekend.

"This is a huge relief to us that Ted Shulman is behind bars where he belongs," Cheryl Sullenger of Operation Rescue, a prominent anti-abortion organization, said in a story on the group's website. "He often posted threatening comments to our website and called me on my cell phone too many times to count."

Sullenger was not one of the two targets listed in the federal complaint, which has apparently been sealed (the FBI did not respond to requests for comment on Saturday). But she and a number of prominent abortion opponents and conservative activists -- including blogger Jill Stanek, Princeton political philosopher Robert P. George, Father Frank Pavone from Priests for Life, Bryan Kemper of Stand True Ministries, and scientist and pro-life activist Gerard Nadal -- have been frequent targets of Shulman's rants.

Nadal wrote of his relief over the "reprieve from death threats" to himself and his family in the wake of Shulman's arrest, and Sullenger and others were equally grateful.

"He was always brazen in his threats and openly identified himself, telling us not to bother calling the FBI because they would never do anything for us," Sullenger said. "Thankfully, he was wrong about that."

In fact, most stories of violence or threatened violence over the volatile issue of abortion tend to be connected to anti-abortion extremists rather than radicals in the abortion rights camp.

But Shulman is an unusual case in many respects.

His mother is Alix Kates Shulman, a feminist author and political activist who first achieved notoriety in 1972 for her novel "Memoirs of an Ex-Prom Queen," which drew wide coverage for its frank depiction of the sexual experiences of a young Midwestern woman who -- like Alix Shulman -- went off to college in the East. Shulman has spoken of having four abortions, "and not one was the result of carelessness." According to Jill Stanek, Ted Shulman has said two of his mother's abortions were before his birth and two were after.

For whatever reasons, Theodore Shulman -- who goes by Ted -- seemed to fixate on the issue of abortion rights and defined his activism by fierce and often extreme verbal attacks on pro-lifers that often threatened them with a violent end. He liked to allude to himself as the "first pro-choice terrorist" and started a blog called "Operation Counterstrike."

His mission statement says: "Right-to-lifism is murder, and ALL right-to-lifers are bloody-handed accessories. Swear it, believe it, proclaim it, and act on it."

In assisting the FBI over the past few years, Jill Stanek compiled more than 4,000 comments that Shulman posted or tried to post on her site over the last four years or so. One example: "I'm looking forward to watching a documentary entitled 'The Assassination of Jill Stanek'," Shulman wrote on Oct. 27 in a comment using one of his many online aliases.

Stanek told Politics Daily in an e-mail that Shulman's threats to her were not part of the criminal complaint against him.

It's not clear what Shulman may have done to push his actions and rhetoric across the line to alleged criminality. In its website report about Shulman's arrest Operation Rescue includes an audio recording of a threat to Cheryl Sullenger that the group says Shulman left on the group's voicemail:

"Hi Cheryl, I'm calling you to say you need to convert to pro-choice because your Maker is going to send an angel to gather you in very soon, and if you haven't converted to pro-choice by the time you get OFFED you will go to hell and burn!" the message says. "So quick, quick, quick -- convert to pro-choice during the few months you have left on this earth. Do it now!"

In its statement on Shulman, Operation Rescue says that threats to the group and its leader have increased in recent weeks, an increase it links to criticism of Operation Rescue from the liberal MSNBC cable host Rachel Maddow.

Last October, Maddow hosted a documentary, "The Assassination of Dr. Tiller," that examined the assassination on May 31, 2009, of George Tiller, one of just three doctors in the country who performed late-term abortions. While ushering at his church in Wichita, Kansas, Tiller was fatally shot by Scott Roeder, an anti-abortion extremist.

Maddow's show linked Operation Rescue, which led daily vigils outside Tiller's clinic for years, to extreme anti-abortion views.

According to pro-life activists, Shulman is also the subject of a federal investigation in Wichita, which could result in additional charges against him.

 

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]]>FBIOperation RescueOperationRescuepro-choicepro-lifeRachel MaddowRachelMaddowTheodore ShulmanDavid Gibson2011-02-26T21:05:00+00:00Keri Potts' and Lara Logan's Shared Ordeal: Sex Assault Overseashttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/24/keri-potts-and-lara-logans-shared-ordeal-sex-assault-overseas/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/24/keri-potts-and-lara-logans-shared-ordeal-sex-assault-overseas/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/24/keri-potts-and-lara-logans-shared-ordeal-sex-assault-overseas/#commentsFiled under: , ,

Keri A. Potts claims membership in an exclusive club.

But it's a club she never wanted to join.

Potts is a sexual assault survivor. Her ordeal occurred in Rome, but it could have happened anywhere. On a college campus like Notre Dame. At a high school party in Texas. In Egypt while on a journalism assignment.

"I'm a sexual assault survivor," said the svelte, curly-haired, 33-year-old. "That's the first time I've said that in a room full of people."

Potts was featured speaker at this week's lunchtime lecture at the Clinton School for Public Service in Little Rock, Ark. Potts, an ESPN executive, displayed a range of emotions as she recounted her story. To be clear, she says, it is her story and when she speaks, she is not speaking on behalf of her employer.

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The story she weaves horrifies and haunts.

It began on the last day of her vacation in Rome in 2009, where she'd gone with a girlfriend.

Here's what Potts said happened:

On that day, she met an Italian artist she said was charming and well-known. He seemed interested in her. She seemed interested in him. They had drinks. He bought her three dozen yellow buds. He invited her back to his sixth-floor apartment. She made it clear she didn't want sex. He insisted he just wanted to talk about art.

The night took a horrible turn.

He suddenly pulled her to him, and his unwanted advances escalated from refusing to release her to biting her lips to shoving his hand inside her underwear, Potts said.

He grew angry, and when Potts, who had taken a self-defense course years earlier, struck her attacker, he hit her back, she said. She pushed him to the floor and jumped from the balcony, landing on another one below. Like James Bond, she said, she jumped to another balcony and kept running.

Potts could have left the country and never told anyone. But she didn't. She promptly went to the U.S. Embassy and began a two-year court battle to seek justice, she said.

"Sexual assault survivors are everywhere," Potts explained to the audience. "I wanted to remove the fear and understand. I hoped to be a better person to my fellow woman."

Potts also created a blog -- A Fight Back Woman -- where she chronicled her assault. Her mission is simple: She wants to tell women that they have power. They can defend themselves. "Women aren't taught that," she said. "Power is outsourced to men and guns."

In Italy, she faced complications. Potts said she had to have an interpreter and a legal team. Initially, her police report contained four major errors because of language barriers. After she returned to the United States, she visited Italian embassies to deal with paperwork. This continued for a year while an investigation proceeded.

But Potts' perseverance paid off. The man, whom she calls Marco, was initially charged with attempted sexual assault. That increased to sexual assault. A charge of assault was also added, meaning he could face additional prison time. But he plea-bargained and, last April, received a suspended sentence. He did not face jail time.

Potts said he is on probation for five years. If he commits a crime, he goes straight to prison. He had to pay her legal fees, she said.

CBS' chief foreign correspondent Lara Logan's recent sexual assault in Cairo deeply affected Potts, who had traveled alone to foreign countries before the Rome incident. She disagrees with Logan's critics, who said she had no place covering the news in Egypt because she was a woman.

"The world needs women like Lara taking on roles that were exclusively male and making gender a non-issue in order to provide a different voice and perspective," she said.

Potts said that "mob violence can happen anywhere, even here, where women are sexually assaulted. So saying it happened to her because she was in Egypt would be irresponsible."

Recently, Texas Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee called upon the U.N. ambassador from Egypt "to apologize to Ms. Logan and apologize to the American people for the tragedy that happened to this woman who was doing her job -- the sexual assault, the vicious sexual assault that occurred to her."

But so much more needs to be done. Potts said that funding for education and programs that address this issue should be a top priority in Washington because the audience at risk of sexual assault is half the U.S. population.

"Right now, the [Department of Justice's] Violence Against Women Office is not where I think it could be. Most women don't know it even exists or who its leader is," she said.

She'd also like to see some changes in the U.S. culture.

"The atmosphere of misogyny contributes to sexual assault," she said. "From commercials that make women one of three roles: nagging, sexpots or ditzy, to limited, lesser roles women can play in TV or film -- or even play in the business world -- to making the conversation about how women must be perfect to avoid being raped instead of recruiting men to demand better of their sex, we fail women and men. We fail little girls."

 

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]]>Amanda Knoxdepartment of justicekeri pottslara loganlara logan sexual assaultmichelle obamaNancy Pelosisheila jackson leeviolence against women officeSuzi Parker2011-02-24T22:00:00+00:00WikiLeaks Founder Julian Assange Can Be Extradited to Sweden, Judge Ruleshttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/24/wikileaks-founder-julian-assange-can-be-extradited-to-sweden-ju/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/24/wikileaks-founder-julian-assange-can-be-extradited-to-sweden-ju/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/24/wikileaks-founder-julian-assange-can-be-extradited-to-sweden-ju/#commentsFiled under: , , , ,

LONDON -- In a swift and stunning rebuke, a British court has ruled that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange must return to Sweden to face questioning on sexual assault charges. He has seven days to appeal the ruling; otherwise he must leave the U.K. within 10 days.

Assange has been fighting extradition since he was taken into custody and later placed on house arrest in December. He has consistently denied the allegations made by two women in August 2010.

Assange also fears eventual extradition to the U.S., where he could face espionage charges related to WikiLeaks' release of thousands of confidential U.S. military and diplomatic documents.

New terms of Assange's bail will be determined later Thursday.

Things weren't looking good for him going into the Thursday's hearing. Earlier in the week, a prominent expert on extradition law in the U.K. declared that, based on his reading of the case, it was "very likely" that Assange would be ordered by District Judge Howard Riddle to return to Sweden to face the assault charges.

And today in court, that proved to be true. In point after point, the judge systematically dismissed all of the defenses' key arguments for why Assange shouldn't have to leave the country.

Specifically, Riddle rejected the argument that Assange would not receive a fair trial in Sweden. While acknowledging that there had been "considerable adverse publicity against Mr. Assange in Sweden," including from the prime minister, he felt that any irregularities that may have occurred in Sweden would best be addressed there.

Riddle also countered the claim that the European arrest warrant issued by Sweden was invalid because Assange had not been charged with any offense (he is wanted only for questioning). He also rejected the idea that the alleged assaults were not legitimate extraditable offenses because they did not amount to "rape" outside of Sweden. To the contrary, the judge affirmed, they would count as rape here too.

But the key point centered on whether Assange had made himself available for questioning by the Swedish prosecutor back in the late summer and early fall, when the charges first surfaced. In a blunt reprimand, Riddle accused Assange's lawyer of a "deliberate attempt to mislead the court" in saying that the Swedish prosecutor had not attempted to interview his client before he left that country.

Meanwhile, Assange's online supporters -- in anticipation of this outcome -- have already begun mobilizing against the British government. This month Anonymous, the "hacktivist" collective behind pro-WikiLeaks cyber protests, called on supporters to flood British government websites with distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, intended to shut down a website by flooding it with requests for information.

The Australian ambassador to Sweden has also written to Britain's justice minister seeking assurances that Assange, who is an Australian citizen, be treated justly under Swedish and international law, should he be extradited there. Human rights campaigners have raised concerns about the application of European arrest warrants, arguing that they are sometimes applied before a case is ready to prosecute.

Assange has vowed to appeal the district court ruling, which he claims is politically motivated by his WikiLeaks work. If the appeal is granted, this case could conceivably drag on into the summer.

Otherwise, Assange will be sent to Sweden in early March.

Follow Delia on Twitter.

 

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]]>assange extraditionjulian assange extradition hearingjulian assange extradition swedenjulian assange rape chargesDelia Lloyd2011-02-24T07:55:00+00:00Dublin Archbishop Washes Feet of Sex Abuse Victimshttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/21/dublin-archbishop-washes-feet-of-sex-abuse-victims/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/21/dublin-archbishop-washes-feet-of-sex-abuse-victims/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/21/dublin-archbishop-washes-feet-of-sex-abuse-victims/#commentsFiled under: , , , , ,

Archbishop Diarmuid Martin of Dublin has been seen as a rare champion of reform and repentance in the Catholic hierarchy as the clergy sex abuse crisis has pushed the Irish church to the abyss, and he reinforced that reputation on Sunday by washing the feet of eight abuse victims during a service in the cathedral in the Irish capital.

Martin was joined by Cardinal Sean O'Malley of Boston, who has been spending time in Dublin as part of a Vatican team sent to assess the state of Catholicism in Ireland, which O'Malley reportedly planned to tell Pope Benedict XVI was "on the edge of collapse."

At the start of the 90-minute liturgy "of lament and repentance" Archbishop Martin and Cardinal O'Malley both prostrated themselves in silent prayer before the altar, the Irish Times reported.

The service was largely prepared by the victims and included readings from a damning 2009 Irish government report on widespread child abuse by priests in the Dublin archdiocese between 1975 and 2004. The report said the church in Ireland had "obsessively" concealed the abuse.

"For covering up crimes of abuse, and by so doing actually causing the sexual abuse of more children...we ask God's forgiveness," Archbishop Martin told the congregation in St. Mary's Pro-Cathedral. "The archdiocese of Dublin will never be the same again. It will always bear this wound within it."

Martin knelt as he washed the feet of five men and three women who had been abused by priests as children. O'Malley then dried their feet in a ritual that is seen as a classic gesture of penance and humility. The service recalls the passage in the Gospel in which Jesus washes the feet of his disciples, a scene that priests and bishops reenact each Holy Thursday evening before Good Friday and the celebration of Easter the following Sunday.

"For them to get down on their knees, it was humbling," Darren McGavin, 39, who was abused as a child, told Reuters. "I've found it hard to forgive, but today I found a small bit of closure."

"Today was a day of liberation for me," said another of the eight victims, a 63-year-old. "I never thought I'd live to see this day when the church gave full recognition for the horror that was there."

O'Malley said that the washing of the feet was a gesture of atonement that victims wanted and deserved.

"The wounds carried in Ireland as a result of this evil are deep and remind us of the wounds of the body of Christ. We think of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane as he experienced his own crisis," he said.

"He, too, was overwhelmed with sorrow, betrayed and abandoned. Not only survivors of abuse and their family members, but many of the faithful and clergy throughout Ireland can echo our Lord's plaintive cry, 'My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?' "

"But today, through the saving power of the cross, we come together to share in each other's sorrows as well as our collective hope for the future."

A woman victim also read from Matthew's gospel about Jesus and children, and his words that "anyone who is the downfall of one of these little ones...would be better drowned in the depths of the sea."

At the end of the liturgy a "Candle of Protection" was blessed by Archbishop Martin and lit from the Paschal Candle before it was carried in procession to nearby St Joseph's altar.

 

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]]>Archbishop Diarmuid MartinCardinal Sean OMalleyCardinalSeanOmalleyDublinfeet washingFeetWashingIrelandpenancesex abuse victimsSexAbuseVictimsDavid Gibson2011-02-21T13:46:00+00:00Judge Rules Loughner Search Warrant Will Stay Private For Nowhttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/18/judge-rules-loughner-search-warrant-will-stay-private-for-now/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/18/judge-rules-loughner-search-warrant-will-stay-private-for-now/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/18/judge-rules-loughner-search-warrant-will-stay-private-for-now/#commentsFiled under: ,

A federal trial judge Friday afternoon refused for now to order the release of search warrant information about Jared Lee Loughner, the suspect in the Jan. 8 Tucson shooting that left six dead, including Arizona Chief U.S. District Judge John M. Roll, and 14 injured, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.).

However, U.S. District Judge Larry A. Burns refused a defense request to block the public release of Loughner's official mug shots. Instead, Burns ruled that the U.S. Marshal's Service, which took and now holds the photographs, must determine under its own procedures whether they can be distributed to media organizations which have requested them. Legal precedent in the 6th U.S. Circuit appears to require the release of the photographs in Ohio, Michigan, Kentucky and Tennessee and at least four news organizations in those states have formally requested the images under the Freedom of Information Act.

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Burns, who is presiding over the case from his home court in San Diego, ruled against the media when said he would continue to seal the search warrant information until March 9, at which time federal grand jurors are expected to hand up a new indictment against Loughner. "It'll likely be a different story as of March 9," Burns said in court Friday. That superseding indictment likely will include first-degree federal murder charges against Loughner, which would make him eligible for the death penalty.

Burns, a nominee of President George W. Bush, was selected to handle the case after all of Arizona's federal trial judges recused themselves as a result of Judge Roll's death. Loughner was not present at Friday's hearing, which took place in San Diego.

The mug shot photographs, which were taken after Loughner was transferred from local to federal custody, are different from the widely distributed photograph of Loughner released to the media on Jan. 10 by the Pima County Sheriff's Department. The federal photographs show "Mr. Loughner in sharper resolution with abrasions on his face and in prison garb, with a cinder block wall in the background," according to court documents filed earlier this week by federal prosecutors.

Friday's hearing was unusual in that federal prosecutors and Loughner's defense attorneys both argued against the release of the photographs and case information. In their filing, Justice Department lawyers wrote: "Release of defendant's booking photograph would only exacerbate the current publicity at this sensitive pretrial stage. This action would be analogous to sealing a document or restricting the use of discovery."

The U.S. Marshal's Service also opposes the release of the photographs. There is no legal precedent in the 9th Circuit, which covers both California and Arizona, requiring the Service to release the photos to the public. However, there is such precedent in those states covered by the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. Burns said Friday that he had no authority to countermand a ruling by that federal appeals court, especially since it is beyond his own circuit, and labeled the federal photographs as "tamer" than the one previously released.

 

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]]>ArizonadailyguidanceFirst AmendmentJared Lee Loughnermug shotsmugshotsRep. Gabrielle Giffordssearch warrantSixth AmendmentTucson shootingtucson shootingsU.S. District Judge Larry BurnsAndrew Cohen2011-02-18T19:50:00+00:00Gabrielle Giffords Fundraiser Planned -- Could Senate Be in the Picture?http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/17/gabrielle-giffords-political-future-could-senate-be-in-the-pic/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/17/gabrielle-giffords-political-future-could-senate-be-in-the-pic/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/17/gabrielle-giffords-political-future-could-senate-be-in-the-pic/#commentsFiled under: , , , , , , ,

Carefully and without fanfare, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' friends and political allies are starting to talk about her political future.

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) plan to host a fundraising event in Washington next month for a possible Giffords' reelection campaign in Arizona next year. Although the Democratic congresswoman almost certainly won't be in attendance, she continues to make a remarkable recovery from the gunshot wound to the head that she suffered in a shooting rampage in Tucson on Jan. 8.

On Wednesday, her chief of staff, Pia Carusone, said doctors have not yet told Giffords details of the incident that left six dead and 13 others wounded outside a Tucson supermarket. They don't think it is fair to "tell someone something so tragic" when the person may not yet have the ability to ask detailed questions in response, Carusone said in a CBS "Early Show" interview.

"She certainly knows there's been a tragic event," Carusone said. "The details of the severity of the injuries to others, she doesn't yet know about. But she will in time, when she's, you know, at a higher level of communication."

Of course, her political friends cannot be certain at this point whether Giffords will even decide to seek a fourth term in her Arizona congressional district. But Democrats in the state are looking for a strong candidate to run for the Senate seat of Republican Jon Kyl, who has announced he won't run for reelection in 2012.

"It's something she talked about [before she was wounded] but not something she talked about in any great detail," Wasserman Schultz told the New York Times. "When she does come back, she will go though the same process that everyone who considers running for higher office does."

On the Republican side, Rep. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) has already announced he will be a candidate for Kyl's seat. Giffords had $285,501 cash on hand in her campaign treasury at the end of January, according to Politico, which first reported the fundraiser.

Folo Tom Diemer on Twitter http://twitter.com/tomdiemer

 

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]]>dailyguidanceDebbie Wasserman SchultzGabrielle Giffordskirsten gillibrandTom Diemer2011-02-17T11:41:00+00:00Colorado Congressman to Hold Public Meeting for First Time Since Giffords' Shootinghttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/16/colorado-congressman-to-hold-public-meeting-for-first-time-since/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/16/colorado-congressman-to-hold-public-meeting-for-first-time-since/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/16/colorado-congressman-to-hold-public-meeting-for-first-time-since/#commentsFiled under: ,

Colorado U.S. Rep. Ed Perlmutter will hold a public meeting at a Safeway store on Saturday for the first time since Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot at a similar event Jan. 8.

Perlmutter, a Democrat, started his "Government in the Grocery" event after taking office in 2007, holding more than 70 open meetings at supermarkets. He postponed an event earlier this month because of the Giffords' shooting.

A news release by said the congressman and Safeway have consulted with law enforcement to ensure the safety of everyone involved.

As Giffords held a similar meeting at a Tucson Safeway, a lone gunman shot the congresswoman point-blank in the head then fired off many other rounds into the crowd that had come to meet her. U.S. District Judge John Roll, 9-year-old Christina Taylor Greene and four others died. Giffords and a dozen others were wounded.

Jared Loughner, an apparently troubled young man who had met Giffords at a previous supermarket meeting, faces federal homicide charges in the case.

Giffords is rehabilitating at TIRR Memorial Hermann Hospital in Houston. Tuesday, her chief of staff told the ABC's "Early Show" that the congresswoman isn't fully aware of what happened the day of the shooting, including that Roll, Taylor Greene and others died.

"She certainly knows that there's been a traumatic event here," said Pia Carusone, Giffords' chief of staff. "The details of the severity of the injuries to the others, you know, she doesn't know yet about. But she will in time, when she's, you know, at a higher level of communication. Doctors have said it's not really fair, as you can imagine, to tell something so tragic to someone that might not have the ability to ask the detailed questions that someone will have when they hear this news."

Doctors and friends are marveling at Giffords' recovery, even mentioning her as a candidate for retiring GOP Sen. John Kyl's seat, though it's also unclear how much long-term damage she'll experience.

In Colorado, Perlmutter said it's time to return to the grocery store to meet his constituents.

"Government in the Grocery is about being available to listen to the hardworking people in the 7th CD in a less formal setting to talk about the issues on their mind," he said in a news release. "This kind of access is essential to the fabric of our democracy."

Kris Staaf, Safeway's director of public affairs, said in Perlmutter's news release: "We've recently spent a significant amount of time evaluating our company policy surrounding these programs. Safeway periodically hosts events for community organizations, elected officials, and other groups within our neighborhoods. After careful consideration, we have decided to continue allowing elected officials to meet with their constituents at our stores."

 

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]]>7th congressional districtcoloradodailyguidanceed perlmutterexpire-images:2011-3-18Gabrielle Giffordsgabrielle giffords shootingpublic meetingsafewayTucsontucson shootingSandra Fish2011-02-16T21:40:00+00:00Assange, Berlusconi and the Sex Lives of Othershttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/14/waiting-for-art-assange-berlusconi-and-the-sex-lives-of-other/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/14/waiting-for-art-assange-berlusconi-and-the-sex-lives-of-other/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/14/waiting-for-art-assange-berlusconi-and-the-sex-lives-of-other/#commentsFiled under: , , , , ,

LONDON -- In his impassioned defense of Bill Clinton during the Senate's 1999 impeachment trial, Arkansas Sen. Dale Bumpers paraphrased a famous quote by the journalist H.L. Mencken: "When you hear somebody say, 'This is not about money' -- it's about money. And when you hear somebody say, 'This is not about sex' -- it's about sex."

How true. Back then, we all said that what we really cared about was whether President Clinton had lied under oath. But what we really focused on was the prurient testimony of one Monica Lewinsky, with her sordid tales of stained blue dresses and the creative use of cigars.

The same could be said of two legal cases currently drawing headlines in Europe: those of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange and Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi of Italy.

In Assange's case, the main legal issue at his extradition hearing in London last week was whether the arrest warrant issued by the Swedish government for allegations of rape was executed properly. The hearing also addressed whether he could, in fact, get a fair trial in Sweden.

But what many people will remember most about this case long after it's resolved will be the closing arguments made by Assange's lawyers last Friday. At one point, his defense attorney described the claim by one of the women in question -- known as Miss A -- who has accused Assange of ripping off her clothes, snapping a necklace, pinning her down and trying to force himself on her without wearing a condom.

The defense's interpretation of that act: Assange using the weight of his body to pin her down "describes what is usually termed the missionary position," the lawyer said. He added that "sexual encounters have their ups and downs, their ebbs and flows. What may be unwanted one moment can with further empathy become desired."

And then the coup de grace: "If Sweden [said] sucking toes without washing . . . is rape . . . then that would be an extradition offense?"

Sucking toes? The missionary position? Assange's attorney had a legal aim in dragging up all this titillating stuff. He wanted both to call into question the inherently murky concept of "consent" as well as to demonstrate the lack of "double criminality" - i.e., that the allegations made against Assange were offenses under both Swedish and English law. (Rape laws in Sweden are a good deal more flexible than the narrower definitions elsewhere, including in the U.K.)

There's no question that rape is an inherently difficult topic to address legally, as my colleague Sarah Wildman has argued on these pages before. And it's worth noting that the prosecution wasn't buying Assange's defense. Acting on behalf of Sweden, chief prosecutor Clare Montgomery said that, with respect to Miss A's claims: "In popular language, that's violence." She also referenced the claims of a second woman, "Miss B," who alleges that Assange had sex with her while she was sleeping: "If you penetrate a sleeping woman, there's an evidential assumption that she did not consent."

We'll know the outcome of the extradition hearing -- which will determine whether Assange must return to Sweden for further questioning about these alleged rapes -- on Feb. 24.

But I guarantee that regardless how the British court rules, what the public will most remember is the image of Assange sucking someone's toes.

Of course, all of that pales in comparison to the details leaking out of the investigation into Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi's private life. Last week, Italian prosecutors requested that he be put on trial immediately for sex-related offenses that carry a maximum prison sentence of 15 years.

At issue is whether the prime minister paid an underage prostitute to have sex with him and whether, in turn, he used the power of his office to cover up the alleged crime. Early Tuesday, a judge decided to fast-track a trial, which will begin April 6 in Milan. A panel of three judges -- all women -- will hear the case.

But even though it is the abuse-of-office charge that carries the much steeper sentence (up to 12 years vs. up to three for paying for sex with a minor), it is sexual offense -- coming on the heels of several other recent disclosures -- that has attracted the ire of the Italian public, and Italian women in particular.

As part of the investigation, prosecutors raided a series of properties Berlusconi owns in Milan that were allegedly used to house a "harem" of young women who dressed up in nurse's outfits and policemen's uniforms and performed striptease for the Italian leader. In these properties, police allegedly found sex toys, expensive jewelry and envelopes stuffed with 20,000 Euros ($27,000).

As I wrote in an earlier post, Berlusconi has always been the proverbial politician with nine lives, surviving scandal after scandal surrounding his often colorful relationships with women. But there is a sense that Italy has finally had enough.

On Sunday, thousands of Italians took to the streets in some 200 cities across the country to protest Berlusconi's attitudes toward women. The largest event was in Rome, where organizers said 100,000 people gathered under the slogan "If not now, when?"


Women's groups in particular are fed up with the way women are portrayed in the Italian media (which is largely owned by Berlusconi himself). For them, the current scandal highlights a troubling message: the way for a woman to get ahead in Italy is to sell her soul, if not her body, to powerful men.

The Assange and Berlusconi cases hinge on whether each committed a criminal offense. But we already know way more about their sex lives than we possibly could have imagined back in the days when "Julian Assange" was just a weird, secretive computer hacker who seemed to have wandered off the film set of "The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo."

And that's just how we -- as a public -- want it.

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]]>berlusconi sex scandalberlusconi trialberlusconi underage prostituteberlusconi women protestsjulian assange extradition hearingjulian assange rapejulian assange rape chargesDelia Lloyd2011-02-14T22:30:00+00:00Legal Battle Over Tucson Defendant Jared Loughner's 'Real' Mug Shothttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/12/legal-battle-over-tucson-defendant-jared-loughners-real-mug-s/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/12/legal-battle-over-tucson-defendant-jared-loughners-real-mug-s/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/12/legal-battle-over-tucson-defendant-jared-loughners-real-mug-s/#commentsFiled under: , , ,

We've all seen the photograph by now -- those of us who wanted to, anyway. In it, Jared Lee Loughner, the Tucson shooting suspect, stares directly into the camera, head shaved clean, eyes wide open, with a slight smirk that is, at best, unsettling.

If the photo were ever introduced at trial -- which is unlikely-- federal prosecutors might say it shows the ubiquitous "face of terror." Defense attorneys, on the other hand, likely would counter that it's some visible proof of their client's unbalanced mental state in the hours following his alleged crimes. Either way, the picture, released to the public Jan. 10 by the Pima County Sheriff's Department, already is an indelible public image from that deadly weekend.

But it turns out that the Loughner "mug shot" photo the world has come to know wasn't his official post-arrest booking photo. Those were taken by federal authorities, not the county sheriff's department, and they have yet to be released to the the public. On Friday, the San-Diego-based judge who is presiding over the Loughner case, U.S. District Judge Larry Burns, temporarily blocked the U.S. marshals from making the photos public, pending a hearing next Friday.

Judge Burns acted upon an emergency request from Loughner's attorneys. They argue that the release of the formal federal booking photos, just one month after the deadly shootings and wounding of Rep. Gabrille Giffords, would violate Loughner's privacy rights and jeopardize anew his right to a fair trial, free of unduly prejudicial pretrial publicity. The lawyers do not want to see a new round of sensational headlines accompanying release of the new photos just as public interest in the case begins to wane; the damage from the initial photograph, they might candidly concede, has been bad enough.

Defense counsel, in turn, sought help from Judge Burns after learning that someone -- exactly who is not yet known-- filed a request for the release of the photos under the Freedom of Information Act, which generally requires the goverment to make available official records unless they fall into certain specific exemptions. Mug shots are not typical public records, defense attorneys argue, citing the following language from a 1999 ruling by a federal trial judge in Louisiana:

. . . [A] mug shot is more than just another photograph of a person. Mug shots in general are notorious for their visual association of the person with criminal activity. Whether because of the unpleasant circumstances of the event or because of the equipment used, mug shots generally disclose unflattering facial expressions. They include front and profile shots, a backdrop with lines showing height, and, arguably most humiliating of all, a sign under the accused's face with a unique Marshals Service criminal identification number."

Loughner's attorneys also told Judge Burns that there is no reason to allow the photo's release under the Information Act because it is designed to make public evidence of "government conduct," not evidence of "private information." So far, only one federal appeals court, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, has ruled that booking photos may be shown to the public before trial. The U.S. Supreme Court has never squarely addressed or resolved the issue. Judge Burns asked prosecutors to respond to these defense arguments this coming week and we may not know the result until sometime after the Feb. 18 hearing.

Whether or not the judge ultimately orders the release the photos, the episode marks the first time in the short history of the case that defense attorneys have formally (and publicly) complained about the government's broad dissemination of information concerning their client. While it's too early to predict whether this suggests a strategy on the part of Team Loughner, it's surely an early sign that the defense is going to be more aggressive going forward in shaping the way he is portrayed in the court of public opinion.

The episode also begs the question: where were the defense attorneys before, when local law enforcement officials were releasing to the public the Loughner photo we've all seen? The short answer is: they weren't yet fully up and running on Jan. 10, they had no opportunity to know in advance that Arizona officials would show the image, and there was even some uncertainty over who would preside over the case (or hear an emergency motion). That's because all of Arizona's federal trial judges were in the process of recusing themselves in the wake of the death of Chief U.S. District Judge John M. Roll -- one of six people killed that day outside the Safeway in Tucson.

 

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]]>ArizonaFirst Amendmentgag orderJared Lee Loughnermug shotspretrial publicityRep. Gabrielle GiffordsSixth AmendmentTucson shootingAndrew Cohen2011-02-12T10:40:00+00:00Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer Raises Stakes in Immigration Fight With Obamahttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/11/arizona-gov-jan-brewer-raises-stakes-in-immigration-fight-with/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/11/arizona-gov-jan-brewer-raises-stakes-in-immigration-fight-with/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/11/arizona-gov-jan-brewer-raises-stakes-in-immigration-fight-with/#commentsFiled under: , , , , , , , , , ,

As the nation watches Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' inspiring recovery from an assassination attempt, the border state's bitter struggle to enforce immigration laws might seem like yesterday's headlines, far removed from the life-and-death drama of the deadly shootings in Tucson last month.

But the immigration issue, or rather illegal immigration issue, never went away. It is still front and center for state officials -- "by far the number one issue," Gov. Jan Brewer said in announcing this week that Arizona would countersue the federal government for the right to police its border with Mexico.

"Our citizens have lived with this dark cloud for too long," the Republican governor said. "It's time for the federal government to do its job and secure the border."

But the Department of Homeland Security, one of the defendants in the suit, says it is doing its job, and a spokesman said the state's case was without merit.

Arizona's lawsuit serves as an answer to the Justice Department's legal challenge to the state's tough immigration law, which requires police to check the legal status of anyone stopped for a suspected offense in the state. (That part of the law has not been enforced since it was stayed by the pending Justice complaint.)

At the Sandra Day O'Connor federal courthouse Thursday, an angry Brewer nearly shouted as she made her case for the countersuit. "It's the federal government's responsibility to protect the public safety, health and welfare of the people of this country. . . . And the federal government sits by and does nothing," she said. "It's the federal government's responsibility!"

Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano -- who happens to be the former Democratic governor of Arizona -- says the Obama administration is meeting that responsibility. "Illegal immigration is decreasing," she says. "Deportations are increasing; crime rates are dropping." Homeland Security Department spokesman Matt Chandler told the Arizona Republic that a "meritless court claim such as this does nothing to secure the border."

Giffords, who is recovering in Houston from a gunshot wound to the head, opposed the Arizona law. But she has been critical of the federal government's record on illegal immigration and does not support the boycott of Arizona backed by some critics of the law, including a colleague, Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.).

(U.S. District Judge John M. Roll of Arizona and five others were shot dead in the Jan. 8 attack on Giffords outside of Tucson supermarket.)

In Phoenix Thursday, Brewer and state Attorney General Tom Horne acknowledged that the legal battle they were starting would be difficult and costly. Several states in the past have sued the federal government over immigration and failed. Brewer said $4 million in private donations has already been raised to defend the state law. That money can also help pay expenses for the countersuit, she said.

"We did not want this fight," she insisted. "We did not start this fight. But now that we're in it, we will not rest until our border is secured." She said the federal government "sits by and does nothing" while Arizona spends hundreds of millions of dollars "just to maintain the level we're at."

The claim argues what Brewer says are "simple points." The federal government must maintain "operational security" along the border and finish building a promised fence line; it must provide enough border guards to enforce immigration laws; the U.S. must reimburse Arizona for the cost of jailing illegal immigrants who commit crimes; and it should allow the state to enforce federal immigration laws. The complaint also says Arizona should be protected against "invasion," but Horne said that didn't mean one country surging into another, but rather referred to the flood of illegal immigrants streaming into Arizona.

The law signed by Brewer last year requires local police to check for the immigration status of anyone stopped under "reasonable suspicion" of unlawful status. Enforcement of key parts of the law was halted in court after the Obama administration argued that only federal authorities have the right to enforce immigration laws.

Watch some of Brewer's news conference, courtesy KVOA.com Tucson:


 

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]]>arizona immigration lawborder securityjan brewerJustice DepartmentJustice Department sues over Arizona immigration lawTom Diemer2011-02-11T12:12:00+00:00Berlusconi Could Face Trial Soon on Sex Chargeshttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/09/berlusconi-could-face-trial-soon-on-sex-charges/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/09/berlusconi-could-face-trial-soon-on-sex-charges/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/09/berlusconi-could-face-trial-soon-on-sex-charges/#commentsFiled under: , , , ,

LONDON -- Silvio Berlusconi's ongoing legal troubles just got a whole lot worse. On Wednesday, Italian prosecutors requested that the prime minister be put on trial immediately for sex-related offenses that carry a maximum prison sentence of 15 years.

A judge now has five days to decide whether there is sufficient evidence to indict Berlusconi. If she decides that there is, she may consent to a fast-track trial. Otherwise, the process will slow down and involve the Italian parliament.

Berlusconi called the prosecutors' action "disgusting" and characterized it as an attempt to oust his government.

The formal investigation into the prime minister's private life began last month when prosecutors started looking into whether Berlusconi paid an underage prostitute -- Karima el-Mahroug (better know as Ruby Rubacuori) -- for sex last year at his mansion near Milan. She was 17 at the time, and paying for sex with a woman under 18 is a crime that carries a prison sentence of up to three years.

Prosecutors are also looking into whether Berlusconi abused his official position to cover up the alleged crime.

"Rubygate," as the scandal is now called, rose to international prominence last fall when it was learned that Berlusconi had secured the release of El Mahroug following her arrest for suspected theft. He allegedly told police that the Moroccan runaway was the granddaughter of Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak. A conviction for abusing his office could bring a prison sentence of up to 12 years.

Prosecutors have requested an immediate indictment on both counts. Normally, a judge would hold a preliminary hearing in cases such as this before deciding on an indictment, but Chief Prosecutor Bruti Liberati said that Berlusconi should be tried without such a hearing because of the "obviousness of the evidence" against him.

Prosecutors say that where two charges are related and one qualifies for direct indictment of the accused, a fast-track procedure can be applied to both. But Berlusconi's lawyers argue that this motion is in violation of the Italian constitution, which designates that a special tribunal deal with offenses allegedly committed by public officials. They also dispute the age of the dancer (claiming she was 18), which would render one of the charges moot.

Over the past few weeks, the scandal has snowballed. Almost daily, there have been sordid accusations of drug use as well as women in policemen's uniforms stripping at the prime minister's mansions.

The Vatican -- long silent on the matter of the prime minister's unusually colorful sex life -- publicly rebuked him in veiled but pointed language. A top church official called for "all those who hold public responsibility . . . to be committed to a more robust morality, a sense of justice and lawfulness." Pope Benedict XVI himself told an audience of police officers in Rome that public officials must "rediscover their spiritual and moral roots."

Italian women seem particularly put off by the latest round of accusations. Some 73,000 people have signed a petition on the website of the left-wing newspaper L'Unità, urging Italian women to say "enough already" to Berlusconi. A nationwide protest promoted by women is scheduled for Feb. 13.

Berlusconi has denounced the prosecutors' actions as "a disgrace" and "disgusting."

"I'm sorry that we have offended the dignity of, and thrown mud at, the country," he said, adding, "I'm not worried about myself. I'm a rich gentleman who can go on to setting up hospitals for children around the world, as I have always wanted to."

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]]>berlusconi fast track trialberlusconi investigationberlusconi sex offenderberlusconi sex scandalberlusconi trialsilvio berlusconiDelia Lloyd2011-02-09T09:35:00+00:00Julian Assange Extradition Hearing to Continue on Fridayhttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/08/julian-assange-extradition-hearing-to-continue-on-friday/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/08/julian-assange-extradition-hearing-to-continue-on-friday/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/08/julian-assange-extradition-hearing-to-continue-on-friday/#commentsFiled under: , , , ,

LONDON -- WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange returned to British court Tuesday for what was meant to be the second and final day of his extradition hearing. But after a long day of questioning, the judge has still not rendered a verdict, and the case will resume on Friday.

Assange is fighting his extradition to Sweden, where he is wanted for questioning concerning allegations of sexual assault made by two women in August. On Monday, both the defense and the Queen's Counsel (acting on behalf of the Swedish government) presented their opening arguments.

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Today, much of the testimony surrounded the actions of Swedish prosecutor Marianne Ny and whether she had overstepped her bounds in her pursuit of Assange. The defense called a retired Swedish prosecutor (now legal commentator) to the stand. The expert witness, Sven-Erik Alhem, opined that while a European arrest warrant for Assange was not inappropriate under the circumstances, he would have allowed Assange to give his version of events before issuing it and would also have tried harder to interview him in the U.K. The legal expert also said that the prosecutor should not have disclosed Assange's name to the press.

The defense also called Assange's Swedish lawyer, Bjorn Hurtig, to the stand. Hurtig said that he'd seen dozens of text messages sent by one of the women in question which "went against" her allegation last August that she was raped while she was asleep. According to Hurtig, the texts also pointed to a "hidden agenda" this woman may have held against Assange, possibly entailing revenge. He further disclosed that Nye had tried to discourage him from mentioning the texts to anyone.

The atmosphere in court has been quite lively at times. Yesterday afternoon, a retired Swedish Judge described Ny as a "malicious" radical feminist who is "biased against men."

Dramatic flourishes have been no less visible outside the court. Speaking to reporters at the conclusion of yesterday's hearing, Assange likened his ordeal in recent months to a "black box," on which the words "rape" had been written. He maintains that as we open that box -- in a public trial, before the media -- "we see that the box is, in fact, empty."

But it was Assange's British lawyer, Mark Stephens, who stole the show. Describing today's hearing to a group of assembled journalists as "Hamlet without the Princess," he openly challenged Nye -- by name -- to come to London on Friday and answer questions about her handling of the case.

With or without Ms. Ny, the court resumes Friday at 10:30 GMT.

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]]>dailyguidancejulian assange extraditionjulian assange extradition hearingjulian assange extradition swedenjulian assange lawyer mark stephensjulian assange rape chargesmarianne nyswedenDelia Lloyd2011-02-08T17:45:00+00:00WikiLeaks' Julian Assange Fights Extradition in British Courthttp://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/07/wikileaks-julian-assange-fights-extradition-in-british-court/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/07/wikileaks-julian-assange-fights-extradition-in-british-court/http://politicsdaily.com/2011/02/07/wikileaks-julian-assange-fights-extradition-in-british-court/#commentsFiled under: , , , , ,

LONDON -- Julian Assange is back in court Monday to combat his extradition to Sweden. It is the first part of a two-day hearing for the WikiLeaks founder that concludes tomorrow.

Assange, who faces allegations of sexual assault in Sweden, has been held under house arrest in Britain since late December. He is wanted for questioning over allegations of rape, molestation and unlawful coercion made by two women in August. He denies the charges.

Assange's lawyers are combating extradition on both technical and political grounds. On the technical end, they maintain that the arrest warrant issued by Sweden was handled improperly. According to the lawyers, the warrant was issued for the wrong reasons (it seeks to question Assange rather than prosecute him) and by the wrong body (a prosecutor rather than the Swedish National Police Board).
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On the political end, his lawyers are arguing that the lack of public or press access to Swedish rape trials means Assange would be denied a fair trial. They further maintain that Assange has already been a victim of "illegal and corrupt" behavior by the Swedish authorities, both for releasing his name to the press in a possible rape case and for not agreeing to interview him (via Skype) when he offered.

There is also a human rights concern that, if extradited to Sweden, Assange will be in turn be extradited and/or illegally rendered to the United States for his role in leaking secret U.S. diplomatic cables. Once there, they fear that he could potentially face the death penalty.

Finally, the defense also maintains that the sexual acts involving Assange and the two women do not constitute "rape" under British law and are therefore not extraditable offenses.

The prosecution (representing the Crown on behalf of the Swedish government) has already challenged several of the defense's key arguments. At the hearing Monday morning, the lead prosecutor said the warrant brought against Assange "clearly denotes a sufficient intention to prosecute" and the fact that questioning may be required does not undermine its main purpose.

The prosecution maintains that both the alleged rape and three counts of sexual assault occurred without consent and thus constitute offenses under English law.

The European Arrest Warrant Scheme was designed in the aftermath of 9/11 to promote cooperation between prosecuting authorities across Europe so as to expedite simple extradition processes involving member states. Grounds for refusing a request are limited, mainly based on whether extradition would violate a suspect's human rights or whether the arrest warrant was drawn up incorrectly -- both of which are potentially in play here.

English courts have stopped extradition in the past on grounds of political motivation. For example, in a number of cases involving requests by Russia for the extradition of Russian nationals, the courts have found the warrants to be politically motivated.

The Assange hearing continues on Tuesday. If the court decides against him, he can appeal -- a process that could drag on for months.


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]]>dailyguidanceEuropean Arrest Warrantjulian assange extraditionjulian assange extradition hearingjulian assange extradition USjulian assange rape chargesjulian+assangejulianassangewikileakswikileaks+julian+assangewikileaksjulianassangeDelia Lloyd2011-02-07T10:15:00+00:00