The Terror Threat of Raising Your Own Poultry to Lay Fresh Eggs

Which came first? The chicken conspiracy? Or the egg conspiracy?

Collective bargaining law published despite court order blocking it

CLAY BARBOUR and ED TRELEVEN |Posted: Friday, March 25, 2011

The drama over Gov. Scott Walker's controversial measure limiting public sector collective bargaining took a sharp turn Friday when the Legislative Reference Bureau published the law — normally the last step before legislation takes effect.

But the surprise publication on the Legislature's website had lawmakers and their attorneys arguing over whether the law will be in force Saturday.

Walker's legislation has been stuck in court ever since he signed it two weeks ago, challenged by critics who say Republicans violated the state's open meetings law to pass the measure.

A restraining order prevented Secretary of State Doug La Follette from publishing the act. But the state constitution says only that laws must be published before they can take effect; it does not specify by whom.

State statutes require the secretary of state to set a publication date no more than 10 working days after a law is signed, while a related statute requires the Reference Bureau to publish legislation within 10 days of enactment.

Bill Cosh, a state Department of Justice spokesman, said no action by the secretary of state was required for the Reference Bureau to act, adding that La Follette did not direct the publication of the law and thus is not in violation of a temporary court order barring him from publishing the law.

And the governor and Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald, R-Juneau, said flatly Friday the law will take effect Saturday.

But officials with the nonpartisan Reference Bureau and the Legislative Council — the Legislature's drafting and research agency and its legal service, respectively — said publication of the act online was only an administrative step.

Reference Bureau Director Steve Miller and Legislative Council staff attorney Scott Grosz both said La Follette still needs to designate a date for publication and actually publish the act in the Wisconsin State Journal — something the court order bars the secretary of state from doing.

"This bill has been under a cloud of suspicion since day one," said State Rep. Peter Barca, D-Kenosha. "Today's actions and statements are only perpetuating the problem."

After he was ordered not to publish the law, La Follette sent the Reference Bureau a letter March 18 rescinding his instructions setting Friday as the publication date.

But Fitzgerald said attorneys have told him the letter has no standing.

"Every attorney I have consulted said this will now be law," Fitzgerald said. "It wasn't a secret. I think they left the door open for this."

Still, Dane County Circuit Judge Maryann Sumi's March 18 order appears broadly aimed at stopping the law from taking effect until questions about its passage could be addressed.

"I do, therefore, restrain and enjoin the further implementation of 2011 Wisconsin Act 10," Sumi said, according to a transcript. "The next step in implementation of that law would be the publication of that law by the secretary of state. He is restrained and enjoined from such publication until further order of this court."

If the bureau's action did constitute publication, it could make moot the state's appeal of Sumi's order, now before the state Supreme Court.

That could actually simplify the case that District Attorney Ismael Ozanne is seeking to make on the alleged open meetings violation if he doesn't have to worry about whether a judge has the authority to stop legislation before it takes effect, said Madison lawyer Lester Pines.

"I suspect that if Judge Sumi was willing to take up a (temporary restraining order) against publication I suspect she'd do the same thing on enforcement" of the new law, Pines said.

Pines said it would also open up legal channels for other groups who have been waiting to challenge the law but had to wait until it was enacted.

"This is going to unleash a tsunami of litigation," Pines said.

Another Illegal War

Judge Andrew Napolitano - Fox News' one semi-rational voice.

Jesse Ventura Sues TSA for Unlawful Sexual Assault

Jesse Ventura Sues TSA
By: Mark Albert  01/24/2011 KSTP.com 

Former governor Jesse Ventura never shied away from a battle during his term as Minnesota's chief executive.

Now, as a "television performer," as he describes himself in a new lawsuit, the former pro-wrestler is trying to launch a legal smackdown against the agencies that are supposed to protect the flying public.

In a complaint filed Monday morning in the U.S. District Court for Minnesota, Ventura is suing the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and its secretary, Janet Napolitano, as well as the Transportation Security Administration (TSA), and its administrator, John Pistole.

Ventura accuses the agencies of violating his "basic rights to privacy and dignity, and his right to be free from unreasonable searches and seizures," after he received a pat-down by a TSA agent at the Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport in November 2010.

Ventura, who said he has a titanium implant after hip replacement surgery in 2008, alleges the pat-down included "warrantless, non-suspicion-based offensive touching, gripping and rubbing of the genital and other sensitive areas of his body," which, the lawsuit contends, met "the definition for an unlawful sexual assault."

Ventura's Minneapolis-based attorney, David Olsen, told 5 EYEWITNESS NEWS this afternoon, "The security procedures are going too far. There's a line somewhere and he believes that line has been crossed."

Olsen said Ventura no longer flies on commercial aviation because he is unwilling to submit to either a pat-down or a full-body scan, putting his job as host of cable television's Conspiracy Theory show, in jeopardy.

"He's made a decision that someone needs to make a stand and he's not one to back down from a fight," said Olsen. "He sees the erosion of civil liberties here and he's willing to stand up not only for himself, but for others."

A TSA spokesperson said the agency "does not comment on pending litigation."

On its website, the TSA says "Pat-downs are one important tool to help TSA detect hidden and dangerous items such as explosives."

A message left at the DHS in Washington, D.C. was not immediately returned.

In 2001, in the days after the September 11th terrorist attacks, then-Governor Ventura said increased scrutiny would be acceptable.

"We're at war and we're at war inside our own country," Ventura said on Sept. 27, 2001, "something we've never seen or heard of before inside the United States of America. I don't think you can be too careful and people are just going to have to accept a little bit of inconvenience."

Montana GOP policy: Make homosexuality illegal

By MATT VOLZ
9/18/2010

HELENA, Mont. — At a time when gays have been gaining victories across the country, the Republican Party in Montana still wants to make homosexuality illegal.

The party adopted an official platform in June that keeps a long-held position in support of making homosexual acts illegal, a policy adopted after the Montana Supreme Court struck down such laws in 1997.

The fact that it's still the official party policy more than 12 years later, despite a tidal shift in public attitudes since then and the party's own pledge of support for individual freedoms, has exasperated some GOP members.

"I looked at that and said, 'You've got to be kidding me,'" state Sen. John Brueggeman, R-Polson, said last week. "Should it get taken out? Absolutely. Does anybody think we should be arresting homosexual people? If you take that stand, you really probably shouldn't be in the Republican Party."

Gay rights have been rapidly advancing nationwide since the U.S. Supreme Court struck down Texas' sodomy law in 2003's Lawrence v. Texas decision. Gay marriage is now allowed in five states and Washington, D.C., a federal court recently ruled the military's "don't ask, don't tell" policy unconstitutional, and even a conservative tea party group in Montana ousted its president over an anti-gay exchange in Facebook.

But going against the grain is the Montana GOP statement, which falls under the "Crime" section of the GOP platform. It states: "We support the clear will of the people of Montana expressed by legislation to keep homosexual acts illegal."

Montana GOP executive director Bowen Greenwood said that has been the position of the party since the state Supreme Court struck down state laws criminalizing homosexuality in 1997 in the case of Gryczan v. Montana.

EU Authorities: Implementation of Net Surveillance Directive Is Unlawful

Commentary by Katitza Rodriguez | JULY 15TH, 2010

In a landmark announcement issued today, the data protection officials across the European Union found that the way that EU Member States have implemented the data retention obligations in the 2006 EU Data Retention Directive is unlawful. The highly controversial 2006 EU Data Retention Directive compels all ISPs and telecommunications service providers operating in Europe to retain telecom and internet traffic data about all of their customers' communications for a period of at least 6 months and up to 2 years.

European privacy officials from the Article 29 Data Protection Working Party have been reviewing how the EU Member States have implemented these obligations in their national laws.

Among the most important findings of the Article 29 Working Party’s report are:

• "Service providers were found to retain and hand over data in ways contrary to the provisions of the [data retention] directive."
• "There are significant discrepancies regarding the retention periods, which vary from six months to up to ten years, which largely exceeds the allowed maximum of 24 months."
• "More data are being retained than is allowed. The data retention directive provides a limited list of data to be retained, all relating to traffic data. The retention of data relating to the content of communication is explicitly prohibited. However, it appears from the inquiry that some of these data are nevertheless retained."
• Regarding Internet traffic data: "Several service providers were found to retain URLs of websites, headers of e-mail messages as well as recipients of e-mail messages in "CC"- mode at the destination mail server.
• Regarding phone traffic data: "it was established that not only the location of the caller is retained at the start of the call, but that his location is being monitored continuously."
• "Member states have scarcely provided statistics on the use of data retained under the Directive, which limits the possibilities to verify the usefulness of data retention."
• "The provisions of the data retention directive are not respected and the lack of available sensible statistics hinders the assessment of whether the directive has achieved its objectives."

The timing of the Article 29 Working Party’s opinion is particularly sensitive because the European Commission is currently conducting an evaluation of the impact of the Data Retention Directive on economic operators and citizens in Europe. One of the possible outcomes of this evaluation is a recommendation that the Data Retention Directive should be amended or repealed in its entirety. The Article 29 Working Party has submitted its report to the European Commission to provide the Commission with vital empirical evidence for its evaluation of whether to recommend the amendment or repeal the Directive.

Once completed, the Commission’s evaluation will be sent to the European Parliament and the Council of Ministers. Reflecting the far-reaching impact and sensitive policy issues involved in the Data Retention Directive, three Commissioners are likely to be engaged in its review. The EU Commissioner for Home Affairs, Commissioner Malmström leads the evaluation process, but it is expected that Vice President of the Commission and EU Commissioner for Justice, Fundamental Rights and Citizenship, Commissoner Reding and the Commissioner for the Digital Agenda, Commissioner Kroes will also participate actively in the review process.

EFF, AK Vorrat and a coalition of over 100 organizations across Europe recently called for an end to mandatory data retention of telecom and Internet traffic data. In a joint letter sent last month to European Commissioners Malmström, Reding, and Kroes, the coalition urged the Commissioners to "propose the repeal of the EU requirements regarding data retention in favor of a system of expedited preservation and targeted collection of traffic data as agreed in the Council of Europe's Convention on Cybercrime."

In her July 7 reply to the coalition letter, Commissioner Reding stated that, "the review of the EU Data Retention directive provides the European Commission, but also the 27 EU Member States and the European Parliament, with an opportunity to assess the effectiveness and proportionality of the measures included in the Directive. I will in this context ask for a particular focus on the considerable impact data retention may have on fundamental rights of all European citizens, especially with regard to their privacy."

With the recent adoption of the Lisbon Treaty and the entry into force of the Charter of Fundamental Rights, privacy and data protection has been strengthened in the European Union, including in the sensitive areas of law enforcement and crime prevention.

We must now see whether the European Commission will be faithful to the Charter of Fundamental Rights, and recommend the repeal of the overbroad 2006 Data Retention Directive.