The US House of Representatives Select Committee investing the January 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol Thursday issued subpoenas for five Republican lawmakers. The Democrat-led committee subpoenaed House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) and Reps. Scott Perry (R-PA), Jim Jordan (R-OH), Andy Biggs (R-AZ) and Mo Brooks (R-AL). In a press release, Chairman Bennie Thompson [...]
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The US House of Representatives Thursday passed the Ukraine Democracy Defense Lend-Lease Act of 2022, which will streamline the process for the government to lend and lease military equipment to Ukraine. The bill revived a 1941 World War II-era program enacted by President Franklin Roosevelt, which was used to supply food, oil and materials to [...]
Ninth Circuit approves release of video of landmark gay marriage trial
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals Thursday ruled that it would not block an order requiring public disclosure of video recordings of the 2010 trial from a historic case that overturned California’s same-sex marriage ban, paving the way for the videos to be publicly released. Now-retired U.S. District Judge Vaughn Walker presided over the 2010 two-week [...]
Web 3.0: The Goals and Implications of a Decentralized Internet
Previously known as Facebook, tech giant Meta has found itself at the center of several recent scandals. The release of the Facebook papers revealed that the company knew, among several issues, about the mental health impact of Instagram on girls and the spread of misinformation during the latest US presidential election. From its decision to [...]
The Texas Senate Health and Human Services Committee approved two bills on Monday that would require transgender student athletes to participate on school sports teams that align with the students’ biological sex at birth. The Senate committee advanced Senate Bill 2 and Senate Bill 32 in a 6-0 vote. Both bills limit a student’s ability [...]
The Affordable Care Act (popularly known as Obamacare) may be the Supreme Court equivalent of the cat with nine lives. Or at least four. Starting with its decision in NFIB v. Sebelius, 567 U.S. 519 (2012), the Supreme Court has now turned aside three distinct lines of attack on the Act’s controversial “individual mandate” (which [...]
The Case of Rosa Jimenez and the Uphill Battle of Freeing the Wrongfully Convicted
Last week, a Travis County judge in Texas ordered that Rosa Jimenez be released from prison because false scientific testimony was used to secure her 2005 conviction for murdering a 21-month-old toddler in her care. The saga of Jimenez’ wrongful conviction highlights several major flaws in our criminal justice system. At her trial, Jimenez was accused [...]
The Gold Code Standard Revisited: The Danger Of Sole Presidential Authority Over Nuclear Weapons
On January 8, 2021, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) took the extraordinary step of publicly revealing she had talked with Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Mark A. Milley, about “available precautions for preventing an unstable President from initiating military hostilities or accessing the launch codes and ordering a nuclear strike.” [...]
Republicans, the Rule of Law, and the Fate of American Democracy
It is tempting to laugh off the claims about election fraud by President Trump and his Republican followers. Even some Trumpian Republicans have tried, like Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger. He dismissed as “laughable” the effort by Republican Senators David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler to force him out of office because, in their chilling [...]
On This Coming Out Day, The Court Must Let the LGBTQ+ Community In
“Representation matters. I wore my father’s prayer hat, and stood at the steps of the Supreme Court, waving our flag.” – Ibrahim “Ibby” Baig On June 15th, 2020, Ibrahim “Ibby” Baig awaited, like many others, for a decision of paramount importance to the lives of gay Americans to come down from a court which has [...]