Tunisia’s new constitution requires that the initiative process be created, at least for local government. So far, the process has not yet been implemented. This article, by Joe Mathews of California, gives more detail. …read more
Neil Weare, head of We the People Project and an activist to gain voting rights for U.S. citizens living in U.S. territories, will file a new lawsuit on that topic, according to this story. Thanks to HowAppealing for the link. …read more
Here’s the background…
The NSA used section 215 of the Patriot Act to justify mass surveillance of American communications. Edward Snowden revealed this fact to the American people in 2013.
American outrage over this led to public pressure on Congress to end this practice. Congress responded in the usual way, by proposing bills that sounded like reform, but didn’t do much.
The very large police-state caucus in the Senate, led by Senator Mitch McConnell, ignored the public. They insisted that the ONLY path forward was a full, unchanged renewal of Patriot for a whopping five years — Snowden be damned. Then, these …read more
This has been an interesting month for the future of the NSA’s bulk collection of metadata. Near the beginning of the month, the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals ruled “The …
RT.com
The USA Freedom Act has failed in the Senate, stalling an effort to reform certain federal surveillance programs before an end-of-the-month deadline ends the government’s ability to collect the phone records of Americans.
During a Senate vote on Friday, the bill was rejected by a vote of 57-42. It had previously been passed in the House of Representatives with overwhelming success.
The Senate will return to Washington on May 31 to consider ways to prevent the expiration of the program on June 1, according to Republican US Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Had lawmakers approved the Freedom Act, the bulk collection of Americans’ …read more
Dallas, TX — An intense cell phone video was published to the DART police facebook page over the weekend which showed a potentially dangerous situation for both citizens and police.
The video is of an incident which occurred on May 7, but for some reason the poster waited until now to release it.
As the video begins, we see a DART police officer attempting to arrest a man who had been allegedly banned from having access to the DART system.
According to DART spokesman, Morgan Lyons, the man had been banned from the station, and the officer was trying to arrest him, but …read more
California State Senator Sharon Runner has introduced SB 49, to give the Governor discretion to cancel special legislative elections if only one person files to be on the ballot. See this story.
Current law already says that a special election should be canceled if only one candidate files to be on the ballot and no one files as a declared write-in candidate. However, it is believed that there has been no instance of only one candidate filing for a legislative special election, and no write-ins filing either, at least back to 1967. Before 1967, California special legislative elections …read more
The Washington Post has this article about the high cost to the government of Virginia, to defend its redistricting plan in federal court. The challengers argue that the redistricting plan packs too many African-Americans into a minority of districts in which they are in the majority, thus diminishing their clout in many other districts. …read more
Washington, D.C. – Jimmy Kimmel has released a video highlighting the absurdity surrounding recent revelations that Capital Police accidentally left their guns in the Capital’s public bathrooms. The department has announced that its officers will undergo special training on how to use the bathroom while armed.
The video comes after Capital Police Chief Kim C. Dine told Congress on Wednesday, “We are now providing additional training on what to do when you have to go to the bathroom.”
Or as Kimmel so eloquently puts it, “The Capital Police are now undergoing potty training.”
According to the AP:
Dine said he is considering increasing the …read more
San Francisco, Calif. – During a nationwide day of action Thursday to raise awareness about the killing of black women and children by police, topless women blocked traffic in downtown San Francisco.
“@brownblaze: This action today was healing. So amazing. Black women Are infinitely powerful, ya’ll. #SayHerName pic.twitter.com/aYY3U9Iyug”❤️❤️
— Janelle Monáe, Cindi (@JanelleMonae) May 21, 2015
The demonstrations were part of a national campaign to protest the police killings of Tanisha Anderson, Rekia Boyd, Aiyana Jones, Yvette Smith, along with numerous other females killed by police.
Say their names. Read their stories. Demand an end to State violence against Black Women & Girls. #SayHerName …read more
