Wolfowitz, et. al., have announced that due to vital security interests, the next round of reconstruction contracts for Iraq will go only to US companies and companies based in countries that supported the war.

Considering how clear it is that we cannot run or reconstruct Iraq on our own, and that we need international support — real support, not a smattering of Italian troops — this strikes me as a really, really bad call. It’s obviously vindictive, and the stated reason is blatently disingenuous. Neither of these paints us in a very flattering light.

Of course, there’s plenty of commentary. Talking Point Memo includes a bit of the actual document involved, which is interesting. The New York Times coverage will of course expire eventually, but it’s there nevertheless.

The Attorney General of Virginia is seeking to craft a new law that complies with Lawrence v. Texas, but also plans to keep the existing law on the books despite the fact that it can’t be enforced. The reasoning is mind-boggling:

Removing the state’s more than two-century-old law could doom pending court cases involving people charged or convicted under current Virginia law, members of the commission said. “The reason we’re going to do that is right now there are several cases working through the court systems in Virginia,” said Kimberly Hamilton, executive director of the Virginia Crime Commission. “The [Attorney General’s] Office is going to deal with that on an appellate level.”

So they can’t invalidate the current law — which has been struck down by Lawrence already — because there are people charged under it? How’s that again?

Well, it’s not quite as absurd as it sounds. The law in question is the same one prohibiting public sex, a prohibition the high court sees as legitimate. Of course, that’s not the only agenda at work. State House delegate David Albo sums it up:

A lot of people don’t agree that certain sex acts should be legal in Virginia. Some people don’t want to capitulate to a decision by the Supreme Court they consider to be completely wrong.

Unfortunately for Albo, the Supremes think otherwise.

The AG does his best to muddy the issue as one of states-rights and an overreaching judiciary; one hopes that few are fooled by such grandstanding:

“The people of Virginia have a right to say that they do not want these acts performed in public and that such acts, if performed against someone’s will, are criminal,” said [Virginia Attorney General Jerry W.] Kilgore in a written statement.

Granted, of course; that public sex may be prohibited isn’t even at issue, and obviously many acts legal for consenting participants become illegal when done without that consent. He’s parading out the most simplistic of straw men.

“As one who believes that the courts are to interpret and not create law, I disagree with the ruling and am always disappointed when a court undermines Virginia’s right to pass legislation that reflects the views and values of our citizens.”

Whatever, Jerry. Any first-year law student should be able to tell you that the right of a state to pass laws that reflect said “views and values” does not mean they may pass laws in violation of the Constitution. What if the “views and values” include second-class status for African-Americans? Clearly, the issue isn’t as simple as laws reflecting the will of the majority. We have a Constitution to protect our liberties even from the tyranny of that majority. Even if you reject the notion of a Constitutional right to privacy (as established in Griswold v. Connecticut, which held that it really was okay to buy birth control), surely the explicit Equal Protection clauses apply.

All quotes from this Moonie Washington Times story.

Tim Noah at Slate thinks so, and he’s got a point. Rep. Nick Smith (R-Mich) said last month that someone on the House floor threatened to cut his son’s campaign funds (presumably from RNC) if he didn’t support the bill. Curiously, the DOJ has shown no interest in the case.

Or it at least seems that way. In yet another city, the police attack unarmed protesters with overwhelming force for little if any reason.

We’re in desperate need of Arabic translators in our military and intelligence services.

But only if they’re straight. Think about this for a minute: additional Arabic expertise could very well save lives in Iraq and elsewhere. Better intelligence analysis pre-9/11 could have given us critical and disaster-averting data. We’ve got people trained at the Defense Language Institute (viewed by many as the best language school in the world) who want to serve their country in this capacity.

But in the last 2 years, DOD has discharged 37 linguists from DLI for being gay at a time when we need precisely those skills. Damn, that is seriously fucked up.

The Bush administration demanded heavy secrecy measures on Gen. Wesley Clark’s upcoming testimony in the war-crimes trial of Slobodan Milosevic. These measures were not in place for the testimony of other high-ranking officials (Madeline Albright, for example). Joshua Marshall wonders if this is intended to keep Clark out of the spotlight, or just another example of Bush & co.’s ongoing contempt for international law.

When the American Library Association and Phyllis Schlafly’s Eagle Forum agree that something is a bad idea, you know something ugly is being proposed. Check out H.R. 3261: Database and Collections of Information Misappropriation Act; believe it or not, Schlafly’s commentary is pretty clear on the subject. This is a bad, bad, bad idea.

The Times’ Paul Krugman provides an excellent summary of the Diebold mess thus far (NYT link; use nogators/nogators, and remember it’ll go away in a few days, so read quickly).

President Bush made a surprise visit to troops in Iraq today for Thanksgiving dinner. This is easily the classiest act of his absurd presidency. Good job. I don’t like much that this guy has done, but this is at the top of that short list.

A member of Orrin Hatch’s staff has been suspended for “improperly obtaining” some Democratic computer files that were subsequently leaked to the press. It goes further:

In a related development, The Hill learned yesterday that Sergeant-at-Arms William Pickle had hired a renowned counter-espionage and anti-terrorism expert to join the investigation of the alleged theft of internal Democratic documents from a committee computer system. The Hill

Committee Republicans, of course, oppose any wider investigation. I wonder why? Josh Marshall’s TPM has more.

The headline is true: no copyrighted work has passed into the public domain in a long, long time. In fact, nothing copyrighted after Steamboat Willie has behaved as the copyright framers intended and passed into the commons.

Why? In a word, it’s Mickey. Disney and their legislative stooges figure (for the most part accurately) that Americans aren’t paying attention, and won’t mind if they give Disney a few dozen more years of copyright on the Mouse.

The most recent extension, the Sony Bono Copyright Extension Act, prompted a high-profile Supreme Court case (Eldred v. Ashcroft) that unfortunately (but unsurprisingly) went for Disney.

The folks at Illegal Art have posted a new compilation project, Sonny Bono Is Dead, pointing out that the worst part of Mr. Bono lives on in the gradual loss of our cultural commons. Visit to see what copyrighted works would have passed into our collective ownership had their copyright terms not been extended.

The War on Drugs isn’t now, nor has it ever been, going well. What’s the answer? Well, Canada and other countries are experimenting with decriminalizing pot, for one thing. What’s our response? Federal threats for states that consider medical marajuana, and introducing tough new legislation that makes dealing pot more punishable than some violent crime.

Why is my country insane?

In a shocking move, Diebold has decided not to pursue a DMCA suit against those hosting and linking to its leaked memos. Shocking, but at least slighly encouraging; legal threats such as these shouldn’t be used to stop debate on something as important as our elections.

Slacktivist says some interesting things about the production of ethanol, and whether it represents an ecological opportunity or a boondoggle. It’s worth a read.

Via this Slacktivist post, which summarizes an editorial by RFK Jr.

It’s not just civil liberties. It’s not just the environment. It’s not just our international goodwill and prestige. It’s not just our economic situation. It’s not just the erosion of the barrier between church and state. It’s not just the rightward tilt of the Federal bench. It’s all these things.

Congress has approved a new measure that extends the FBI’s domestic surveilance powers. It was tacked on to an intelligence spending bill.

Congress approved a bill on Friday that expands the reach of the Patriot Act, reduces oversight of the FBI and intelligence agencies and, according to critics, shifts the balance of power away from the legislature and the courts. A provision of an intelligence spending bill will expand the power of the FBI to subpoena business documents and transactions from a broader range of businesses — everything from libraries to travel agencies to eBay — without first seeking approval from a judge. (Emph. mine.) Wired News

Oversight? Checks and balances? What are those? This. Has. Got. To. Stop.

An article in the Washington Post details the orgy of spending the GOP is pushing through Congress before concluding the 2003 session. The deficit is out of control, spending is way, way, up, and revenues are being cut. What part of this is “fiscally conservative?”

The Sacramento Bee has a great article on one of Heathen’s favorite subjects; it’s worth your time. Unless something changes quickly, our voting systems will be crimiinally insecure and unverifiable, with no audit trail. The worse case scenario is not a repeat of Florida in 2000: it’s never having the option to recount or review an election in any meaningful way.

Advance reviews suggest these will be on the form of “those against Bush are for the Terrorists” & etc., just as we’ve seen since 9/11. Slacktivist, as always, has some excellent things to say.

Dennis Kucinich has weighed in on Diebold’s actions w.r.t. copyright law and their leaked memos on his Congressional website.

(In case you’re behind: Diebold memos illustrating that they know how absurdly bad their voting systems are surfaced on the Internet; rather than challenge their authenticity, Diebold has tried to use the DMCA to force ISPs to remove the pages in question in an attempt to coverup their incompetentcy.)

Max Cleland was, until the last election, one of Georgia’s two Senators. A triple-amputee due to wounds sustained in Vietnam, was hounded out of office by his GOP opponent who tried to equate him with Saddam and Osama for questioning some changes made to the Homeland Security bill; there are still some questions surrounding his loss.

Fortunately for all of us, Cleland has stayed active. He wrote an essay for Salon in September attacking the Administration’s failure to plan for postwar Iraq; the essay concludes with “Welcome to Vietnam, Mr. President. Sorry you didn’t go when you had the chance.” Score one for Max.

He’s also one of the ten commissioners serving on the independent panel investigating the 9/11 attacks — a commission the White House has resisted at every turn for reasons so far unknown.

Today, Salon’s running an interview with Cleland. It’s worth your time, no matter what you think of the war.