4 posts tagged “law”

A grand jury in Texas indicted Vice President Dick Cheney and former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales

"Lawyers and marriage equality proponents are calling Proposition 8 illegal, and they may have good legal ground to stand on."
Hundreds of gay people and their allies at the Music Box in Hollywood on Election Night thundered their approval when states such as Pennsylvania and Ohio were called for Barack Obama. Like so many others around the world, gay people, anxious for change, felt the pendulum of history about to make a huge sweep in a progressive direction.

Just when we thought the voters of the US were moving forward, the voters of California take a tragic step backwards. How sad, how very sad.

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Please sign this petition!  If you're having problems voting and feel your voting rights were violated go to The Election Violation Report Site and file a report.  A list of telephone numbers by state is available at NASS's State Voter Hotlines

Sign the online petition at http://www.iacenter.org/stopvotersuppression

Online Petition Text:

 

To: President Bush, Senator McCain, Governor Palin, Attorney General Mukasey, Governors of Key States, Congressional and Republican Party leaders and members of the media

 

In the days leading up to a historic election, there has been a massive, illegal attempt to suppress votes, particularly among the poor, communities of color, and students.

 

These tactics include:

 

--In Ohio, the Republicans attempted to illegally challenge the registrations of 200,000 new voters.

 

--Voters, like in West Virginia counties, have reported that electronic voting machines visibly changed their vote to John McCain when they tried to cast their vote for Barack Obama.

 

--Students in Colorado, Virginia, and South Carolina were told that they would lose their scholarships and that their parents could no longer claim them as dependents on their tax returns if the students voted in their college towns.

 

--In Georgia more than 50,000 voters were improperly purged from the voting rolls, a clear violation of federal laws that prohibit massive purging within 90 days of an election. Approximately 4,500 of them have been wrongly identified as “non-citizens”.

 

--In Indiana, Republican officials filed a lawsuit to close down early voting sites in three key Indiana cities—Hammond, Gary and East Chicago. Indiana’s population is only eight percent Black, but Black voters are heavily concentrated in the three cities targeted by the lawsuit.

 

--In Florida, Ohio, Nevada, Virginia and Wisconsin, right wingers are using the Jim-Crow practice of 'caging,' where they send out mass mailings to low-income neighborhoods.  If the letters come back unopened, then those voters are challenged at the polling place.

 

These are just a few of the tactics that have come to light in the recent period which are part of an ongoing pattern of racist disenfranchisement--an illegal campaign to deliberately deprive people of the hard-won right to vote.

 

I demand:

 

•    Stop police intimidation of voters.
•    Keep polls open until everyone has the opportunity to vote.
•    Full emergency staffing of polling places to meet the widely-expected massive turnout.
•    STOP all voter suppression – count all ballots.

Make your voice heard NOW!

Sign the online petition and send a strong, clear message to the White House, Congress, Governors of Key States, and the media.

 

You can sign online at http://www.iacenter.org/stopvotersuppression

WASHINGTON – A judge has ordered the Justice Department to produce White House memos that provide the legal basis for the Bush administration's post-Sept. 11 warrantless wiretapping program.
U.S. District Judge Henry Kennedy Jr. signed an order Friday requiring the department to produce the memos by the White House legal counsel's office by Nov. 17. He said he will review the memos in private to determine if any information can be released publicly without violating attorney-client privilege or jeopardizing national security.
Kennedy issued his order in response to lawsuits by civil liberties groups in 2005 after news reports disclosed the wiretapping.The department had argued that the memos were protected attorney-client communications and contain classified information.
But Kennedy said that the attorney-client argument was "too vague" and that he would have to look at the documents himself to determine if that argument is valid and also to see if there is information that can be released without endangering national security.
Justice Department spokesman Dean Boyd said Saturday the department is reviewing the opinion and will "respond appropriately in court."

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