Dear Feds: End the Al-Arian Travesty of Justice

One of the most Kafkaesque post-9/11 cases is still going on. A hearing this Friday could determine whether the latest stage of the government’s legal campaign against him be dismissed or end in re-trial.

The federal government has Dr. Sami Al-Arian under house arrest currently, stemming from an embarrassing, failed prosecution based on terrorism charges.

Jury Still Out on the Juryless Military Commissions

Soldiers escort an enemy combatant The War on Terror suffered a major lexical loss yesterday when the Obama administration tossed the legalistic euphemism, and Bush invention, “enemy combatant” into the dustbin of shameful history. The Bush administration invented the term in order to circumvent preexisting legal structures that gave the accused an inconvenient array of [...]

California Lawmaker Wants to Carpet Bomb Google Maps to Beat Terrorists

A California lawmaker, Assemblyman Joel Anderson, a Republican, introduced a bill in the state assembly that would require virtual mapping programs to blur out schools, places of worship, government or medical buildings. The punishment for not doing so? Significant fines and possible jail time. The reasoning for this odd measure? To help fight terrorism. Citing [...]

No picnics for Israelis

Joe “The Plumber” Wurzelbacher on Israel getting hit by Hamas rockets: “They can’t plan their day, they can’t take a picnic.” OH NOES! NO PICNICS FOR THE ISRAELIS?! [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UDlst03I3lk] Another gem: “I don’t think journalists should be allowed anywhere near war…Media should be abolished from reporting.” (h/t Jillmz)

Alaa Hlehel: A Nightmare Called Ramadan

Alaa Hlehel is one of the up and coming young Palestinian writers from inside Israel/Occupied Palestine, whom I had the opportunity to meet in Cairo this past May. He is also a journalist, founder-administrator of the Arabs48 website and until recently, the editor-in-chief of Fasl al-Maqal, the newspaper of (Azmi Bishara’s) Balad party, which calls [...]

Democracy Now!’s Amy Goodman, Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Nicole Salazar arrested at the RNC

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYjyvkR0bGQ] As of 10:15pm (EST) Amy has been released, but Sharif and Nicole are still being held without charge. The mayor’s voicemail box is full (651-266-8535), and the Ramsey County Jail phone number (651-266-9350) is no longer in service. But you can e-mail them: Mayor Chris Coleman can be contacted at: https://mn-stpaul.civicplus.com/forms.asp?FID=69Governor Tim Pawlenty can [...]

Al-Hajj’s Heartbreaking Story of an Unjust Detention

Known to the American government as “prisoner #345,”former Guantanamo Bay prisoner Sami Al-Hajj was re-acquainted with his son who he last saw 7 years ago when the boy was 9 months old. Frail and malnourished from the effects of torture and a 2 year hunger strike, Al-Hajj’s weak body (strapped to an ambulance cot) was [...]