FLE

Red tape may delay $400 million for Mexico drug war The Bush administration said Tuesday it would take months, and possibly longer, to deliver $400 million in emergency assistance to help Mexico combat murderous drug cartels, days after pressing Congress to urgently approve the money. Three senior Bush administration officials outlined various bureaucratic impediments to speedy delivery of assistance to bolster Mexican President Felipe Calderon's $4 billion, military-style campaign against drug traffickers. The cartels have killed more than 4,000 people over the past 21 months, including some 450 police officers, soldiers or government officials. Challenges to implementing the first phase of the Merida Initiative include developing coordination between the Defense Department, the State Department and the Treasury; setting benchmarks for success; and prolonged procurements of military equipment such as helicopters and surveillance aircraft. "Both governments have seized a political moment to show solidarity, but the real planning for implementation has yet to take place," said Andrew Selee, director of the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington, D.C. "There was a real sense of urgency to show cooperation, without coordination on a long-term plan."....Ain't this typical. They justify the expenditure because of an "emergency", it takes 14 months from the Summit for Congress to appropriate the money, and will it will take the Bushies upwards of a year to spend it on this "emergency". Two years to respond to an "emergency".... The Bush administration officials spoke as Texans in Congress vowed to re-double efforts to boost federal spending on U.S. law enforcement along the border to balance the aid flowing to Mexico. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas, a member of the powerful Senate Appropriations Committee, had added $100 million to the emergency supplemental spending bill to bolster U.S. law enforcement agencies operating along the U.S. side of the 1,947-mile border with Mexico. But the House knocked the added spending out of the final compromise version of the legislation. Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Austin, said he remained "disappointed and frustrated that we can't get funding on this side that our Border Patrol and sheriffs desperately need."....I'm not sure this money would be spent wisely either, but it does let us know Congressional spending priorities: Mexico $400 million - U.S nada.
NTSB gives cause of crash that killed ICE officer The National Transportation Safety Board says a U.S. Customs and Border Protection instructor pilot's failure to maintain control of the aircraft during an aborted training flight landing contributed to a crash that killed an ICE officer. Julio E. Baray, of El Paso, Texas, was killed in the Sept. 24 crash of a Cessna 210 near the Moriarty airport. The NTSB said an autopsy report listed the cause of death as blunt force injuries to the head. Neither the customs agency nor the NTSB released the name of the instructor pilot, who was injured in the crash. The NTSB said that during interviews, he told investigators he could not remember the flight or the previous several days. Witnesses say the plane had been practicing takeoffs and landings just before the crash. Officials said it went off the runway and caught fire. The NTSB, in a report Monday on the probable cause of the crash, said the instructor pilot's failure to maintain control during the aborted landing and an attempted go-around resulted in a stall and the plane went down. The NTSB also cited the instructor pilot's inadequate supervision during landing.
Mandela off U.S. terrorism watch list Former South African President Nelson Mandela is to be removed from a U.S. terrorism watch list under a bill President Bush signed Tuesday. Mandela and other members of the African National Congress have been on the list because of their fight against South Africa's apartheid regime, which gave way to majority rule in 1994. Apartheid was the nation's system of legalized racial segregation that was enforced by the National Party government between 1948 and 1994. The bill gives the State Department and the Homeland Security Department the authority to waive restrictions against ANC members. The bill is H.R. 5690, which "authorizes the Departments of State and Homeland Security to determine that provisions in the Immigration and Nationality Act that render aliens inadmissible due to terrorist or criminal activities would not apply with respect to activities undertaken in association with the African National Congress in opposition to apartheid rule in South Africa."....
Young Lawyer Takes Victory Lap After Supreme Court Gun Case Win A group of gun rights advocates roared with approval as Alan Gura descended the stairs of the Supreme Court on the morning of June 26, having just learned of the high court's decision in the landmark Second Amendment case, District of Columbia v. Heller. "Goodbye, gun ban!" they chanted. Gura, whom history will remember as the lawyer who successfully argued that Americans have an individual right to keep and bear arms, smiled broadly. Goodbye, gun ban. A few minutes later, Mary Mitchell Purvis, a senior at the University of Mississippi, caught Gura between interviews with Associated Press Television News and National Public Radio. She presented the 37-year-old lawyer with a copy of the Heller opinion. "Would you sign this? I'm doing my thesis on your case." But of course he would. When libertarian activist Robert Levy, the lawsuit's financier, tapped Gura to argue the case before the Supreme Court earlier this year, more than a few Court watchers questioned the young lawyer's qualifications. Though he won the case in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit -- in his first federal appellate arguments -- it was presumed that the high court work would go to a veteran. And now here was Gura, with his shaggy brown hair and iPhone, signing opinions like they just went gold....
The Ancient Right The U.S. Supreme Court D.C. v. Heller decision now makes it clear to all — the Second Amendment affirms an individual right to own firearms for the purpose of self-defense. Even though the Court’s opinion leaves room for laws regulating guns in schools and government buildings, as well as restricting “dangerous and unusual weapons,” these exceptions should be considered just that — exceptions. The opinion devotes only three pages to them, toward the end of a lengthy discourse on the historical basis for the individual right interpretation. Perhaps Heller’s deepest affirmation is that it invokes the natural right of self-defense in support of the constitutional right to have firearms. Writing for the majority, Justice Scalia cites the historical evidence that the founders intended protection of an individual, not a collective right. He quotes founding-era legal scholar St. George Tucker’s version of Blackstone’s Commentaries: “The right to self-defence is the first law of nature: in most governments it has been the study of rulers to confine the right within the narrowest limits possible.” The rulers of big cities in 21st-century America, not to mention assorted despots around the world, have long sought to confine the right within the narrowest limits possible. Those limits have just been greatly relaxed, and it’s only a matter of time before they are pushed back to a level far more in keeping with the view of the Founders....
Gun Rights: Media Armageddon 2008 The Supreme Court ruling on gun laws last Thursday created media frenzy. Editorials, columnists, anchors and pundits predicted it would result in an American Armageddon. According to the major media outlets in the nation, innocent lives will be lost, the Supreme Court justices have joined forces with city criminals and life as we’ve known it is over. Who knew upholding the Constitution would have such disastrous effects? In the 5-4 majority vote, the Supreme Court’s ruling reversed the liberals’ longstanding interpretation of the Second Amendment, that it was a right of the state, not the individual, to keep and bear arms. For the past 70 years, America’s elites viewed the right to bear arms as a collective right. Applied in the District of Columbia, the law prohibited the ownership of handguns and made it a criminal offence to have an operable weapon in the home ready to defend self and family from intruders. While these laws intended to curb gun violence, they failed in that and made it nearly impossible for people to exercise the fundamental right of self-defense. While Americans should celebrate this law for its perpetuation of individual freedoms, the media instead perceives disaster....
Wilmette Suspends Local Handgun Ban Wilmette has suspended enforcement of its 19-year-old ordinance banning handgun possession in the wake of a U.S. Supreme Court decision that appears to invalidate such bans. In a 5-4 decision, the court struck down Washington, D.C.'s ban on handguns, a prohibition similar to those used in several major cities, including Chicago, and a handful of suburbs including Wilmette, Evanston, Winnetka and Oak Park. "The Law Department and the Police Department have suspended enforcement of the ordinance pending further review by the Village Board," Wilmette village attorney Tim Frenzer said Thursday. "Based on the decision today, at a minimum it calls into serious question the continued viability of the ordinance." Frenzer said questions remain about how directly the court's decision will impact local gun laws in Wilmette and other parts of the country. Washington is not a state, and each state has its own legal language governing the right to bear arms. "That aside, the opinion will require further review and discussion by the Village Board, but it's prudent at this point to suspend enforcement of it," Frenzer said. Wilmette's law, enacted in 1989, levied fines of up to $750 for handgun possession and allowed the village to seek a judge's order to have seized weapons destroyed....
A Victory and a Warning The Supreme Court rightly deserves applause for its fidelity to the Constitution in deciding Heller. The case is perhaps the most significant decision of this century. However, Americans should not forget that this was a 5-4 decision. Four justices of the Supreme Court would have ignored the plain language and historical context of the Amendment. Believing themselves at liberty to rewrite fundamental law, these justices would leave Americans at the mercy of armed criminals and a future government tyranny. The Second Amendment is part of the same Bill of Rights that guarantees liberty of the press, the right of assembly, and freedom of religious worship. If a near majority of the Court attempted to erase the Second Amendment from the Constitution, what is to stop them from taking a cavalier approach to other constitutional rights? While Americans should rejoice in the victory for individual rights in Heller, they should not forget that four justices of the nation’s highest court would have eradicated the right to bear arms. If only a slight majority of the Court respects the ancient and fundamental right of resistance and self-preservation, Americans should be concerned about the fate of other liberties enumerated in the Bill of Rights....
Groups Sue U.S. for Data On Tracking By Cellphone Two civil liberties groups filed a lawsuit against the U.S. government yesterday, seeking records related to the government's use of cellphones as tracking devices. The American Civil Liberties Union and the Electronic Frontier Foundation sued the government in federal court in Washington under the Freedom of Information Act. Last November, the ACLU had filed a FOIA request with the Justice Department for documents, memos and guides regarding the policies for tracking people through the use of their cellphones. The groups also want to know how many times the government sought location information without first establishing probable cause that a crime was taking place. The ACLU's FOIA request was made after an article in The Washington Post last fall revealed that federal officials were routinely asking courts to order cellphone companies to furnish real-time tracking data on individuals and that courts sometimes have ordered the data released without first requiring a showing of probable cause....