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Really?

No slippery slope? So holding an american citizen
indefinitely without trial is acceptable. (That's part of the Sixth amendment gone.)

Charged with an offense carrying six or less months in jail PER CHARGE? You have no right to a jury trial.
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury. (I'd say that's the rest...)

Secret searches without a warrant? (ala Patriot act, administrative subpoenas) Thats the Fourth down.

Finally, I've got two more bits of advice.

First, YOU WILL NEVER be safe. Life is inherently unsafe. Deal with it. If in your preference warrantless searches are reasonable, fine, urge your representatives to CHANGE the Constitution. To pay lip service to the Constitution while shredding it is an injustice to your relatives who died bringing it into existence.

Second, we cannot choose our family, nor the circumstances we are born into. The real choice we do have is the ideals by which we live. You may choose a "safer" world in which you are prodded and probed, and generally treated like cattle.

If defending the principles of dignity, liberty and justice is your version of unrealistic and childish behavior so be it, I'm guilty as charged.

Absolutely the best weblog for supreme court coverage is the SCOTUS Blog, sponsored and operated by the DC law firm of Goldstein & Howe, who argue many cases in front of the supreme court. In addition to all the information you could need there is great legal commentary from many guest bloggers.

Any of those three articles gets into the actual legal issues raised better than TFA, probably because they can't make money by flimflamming you.

It's volume. By percentage it's pretty average. Someone put together a scorecard of this for 2003 here and while there's not enough data given only the one year, it's pretty clear that the main thing is that so damn many 9th Cir. cases go up. Way more than from anyplace else.

Basically, the 9th Cir. is too big. It needs to be split into a 9th and 12th, just like we split the old 5th into the current 5th and the 11th. (Hell, you might even be able to split it three ways)

"This is an outright lie -- ballots where hand counted multiple times."

wrong. recount never finished. other inaccuracies you say.

see http://www.goldsteinhowe.com/blog/files/VFPart1.pd f
http://www.goldsteinhowe.com/blog/files/VFPart2.pd f

for excellent recap of what went on in 2000

Vanity Fair article

"This is an outright lie -- ballots where hand counted multiple times."

wrong. recount never finished. other inaccuracies you say.

see http://www.goldsteinhowe.com/blog/files/VFPart1.pd f
http://www.goldsteinhowe.com/blog/files/VFPart2.pd f

for excellent recap of what went on in 2000

Vanity Fair article

This is sure to get the Republicans riled up, especially in Florida.

I doubt the OSCE will be able to do much real monitoring here, but I would certainly welcome additional scrutiny on the paperless-voting side of things. (Obligatory link to blackbox in case anyone hasn't been there.)

I just read a Vanity Fair article on the situation in Florida and it was scary. There's an Acrobatification of it floating around... looks like the PDFs can be found here: part one, part two and... hmmm, I can't find the end bit.

My own informal poll shows a strong European anti-Bush sentiment, which we could safely assume will combine with this initiative to generate a certain kind of PR... mainly negative I expect.

This is sure to get the Republicans riled up, especially in Florida.

I doubt the OSCE will be able to do much real monitoring here, but I would certainly welcome additional scrutiny on the paperless-voting side of things. (Obligatory link to blackbox in case anyone hasn't been there.)

I just read a Vanity Fair article on the situation in Florida and it was scary. There's an Acrobatification of it floating around... looks like the PDFs can be found here: part one, part two and... hmmm, I can't find the end bit.

My own informal poll shows a strong European anti-Bush sentiment, which we could safely assume will combine with this initiative to generate a certain kind of PR... mainly negative I expect.

In 2003, 76.9% of all cases reviewed by the Supreme Court were reversed or vacated. 76% (fewer than average, though not by much) of the ninth's cases were reversed or vacated. Source

From the wikipedia entry:
It is often called "the most overturned appeals court in the United States", but this is mostly a product of its high caseload. On a percentage basis, the circuit is not overturned much more than any other. (Indeed, in 2003 it had the least reversal rate of any appeals court with more than five cases reviewed.[1] (http://goldsteinhowe.com/blog/files/SemiFinalOT20 03CircuitScorecard.pdf)

Amusingly, this particular court is a frequent target for confused US conservatives in spite of the fact that (again, quoting the Wikipedia entry) it's a strong supported of states' rights (even if the state is sometimes psychotically liberal, re: California)
"The court is also on the leading edge of federalism, recently refusing to enforce federal laws against homemade pornography (US v. McCoy), homemade firearms (US v. Stewart), and homegrown marijuana (Raich v. Ashcroft). The court reasoned that application of such laws exceeded Congress's authority under the Commerce Clause, basing the decision on the Supreme Court case United States v. Lopez."

Those sites are not the first to report. The first places I saw it were SCOTUSBlog and CNN. After seeing the idiots responding to the Pledge posting here, not having any idea what the legal issues really are, I figured it wasn't worth my time to submit this SCOTUS news.

Slashdot is great for geek news, but please don't pretend you're lawyers.

The SCOTUS did say that having a librarian temporarily disable the filter is acceptable (and that's why the case was decided this way, in part; it isn't an undue burden, if a legit site is blocked it can be bypassed, and it will prevent a majority of porno or whatever.) Take a look over at SCOTUSblog, there's more information there.

Today's Opinions. Today, the Supreme Court delivered the opinion in Eldred v. Ashcroft. This case concerns the Copyright and Patent Clause of the Constitution, Art. I, 8, cl. 8, which empowers Congress to "[t]o promote the Progress of Science ... by securing [to Authors] for limited Times ... the exclusive Right to their ... Writings." Pursuant to this authority, Congress passed the Sonny Bono Copyright Term Extension Act (CTEA) in 1998 which extended the duration of all copyrights, both existing and future, by 20 years. Petitioner claimed that Congress exceeded their authority under the Constitution's Copyright Clause by applying it retroactively to already existing copyrights. Further, petitioner claimed that the Act violates First Amendment free speech protections. Both the district court and the circuit court rejected petitioner's claims.

The 7-2 majority opinion, written by Justice Ginsburg, here, upheld the CTEA against both the Copyright Clause and the First Amendment claims. As per the Copyright Clause, Ginsburg wrote that the text, history, and Supreme Court precedent all confirmed that Congress is empowered to prescribe "limited times" for copyright protections and "to secure the same level and duration of protection for all copyright holders, present and future." Accordingly, the Court concluded that the CTEA, which continues "the unbroken congressional practice of treating future and existing copyrights" equally, is a permissible exercise of Congress' power under the Copyright Clause.

Turning to the First Amendment claim, Justice Ginsburg wrote that the proximity in time of the enactment of both the Copyright Clause and the First Amendment suggests that the Framers viewed copyright's limited monopolies to be consistent with free speech principles. Additionally, the Copyright Clause has "built-in First Amendment accommodations," by protecting "expressions" but not "ideas." Further, the "fair use" defense even allows the public to use copyrighted "expressions" in limited circumstances. Accordingly, Ginsburg wrote that, because Congress has not "altered the traditional contours of copyright protection" with the CTEA, further First Amendment scrutiny was not necessary.

Justice Stevens wrote a dissenting opinion, arguing that the CTEA's extension of existing copyrights, as opposed to future copyrights, was invalid. Stevens based this opinion on Supreme Court precedent holding that Congress may not extend the life of a patent beyond its expiration date. In Stevens's view, the same restrictions should apply to copyrights as well. Justice Breyer also wrote a dissenting opinion. He argued that the CTEA 20-year extension does not make the copyright term limited, as is required by the Copyright Clause, but instead "virtually perpetual." Further, Breyer argued that the CTEA's primary effect is not to promote science, but to inhibit it. Conceding that the Copyright Clause grants broad legislative power, Breyer nonetheless concluded that the CTEA falls outside that grant, thereby making it unconstitutional.