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Remember the King Ranch, where Dick Cheney shot an old man in the face? Well, American citizens aren't allowed access to the shootings that happen on the Ranch. But they're paying the bills. NPR and the CIR report that Dick and Rove's buddies have been one of the biggest recipient of subsidies from farm bills from 1999 to 2005, sucking in $8.3 million over the time.

I'm watching the HJC hearing on politicized prosecutions. And boy, have the Republicans come loaded for bear, on two counts. First, the Republicans attempted to insinuate that Jill Simpson's allegations about the Don Siegelman prosecution must be false because she did not testify publicly today. Congressman Forbes repeated a tactic Republicans used when Valerie Wilson testified before Waxman's committee--suggesting that Simpson "be referred" to DOJ for investigation.

The WaPo reports that more documents have been unsealed in the Nacchio case--and they show (Prosecutors claim) that Nacchio's claim to have lost business don't hold up. Qwest Communicationsbelonged to a business alliance that won a rich national securitycontract in the summer of 2001, undermining claims that authoritiesretaliated against its former chief executive for refusing to supportan unidentified government program earlier that year, prosecutors saidin documents released yesterday. I'm on two deadlines for

Congressman Waxman gets pretty aggressive in his latest letter to Erik Prince, CEO of Blackwater. He basically accuses Blackwater of evading taxes by treating its employees as independent contractors, rather than employees. I have received documents which suggest that Blackwater may have engaged in significant tax evasion. According to an IRS ruling in March 2007, Blackwater violated federal tax laws by treating an armed guard as an "independent contractor." The implication of

Here's my favorite exchange from Stanford Lawyer's interview of Carol Lam (h/t bmaz): YOU SERVED UNDER BOTH JOHN ASHCROFT AND ALBERTO GONZALES. HOW DID THAT TRANSITION FROM ASHCROFT TO GONZALES AFFECT YOUR LIFE AND YOUR DUTIES AS A U.S. ATTORNEY? The structures of the department were in place, so I didn't expect a lot of impact from the change in attorney general under the same administration.

Yesterday, there were two stories about subpoenas of journalists that suggest something about journalist subpoenas. The first story involves an attempt by some Phoenix big-wigs to cow the alternative New Times into backing off investigations into them. In a breathtaking abuse of the United States Constitution, Sheriff JoeArpaio, Maricopa County Attorney Andrew Thomas, and their increasinglyunhinged cat's paw, special prosecutor Dennis Wilenchik, used the grandjury to subpoena "all documents related to articles

I never wanted Jeffrey Fieger to be my governor. But I'm looking forward to the way he fights his campaign finance charges, particularly now that the judge appears to think the investigation into him was politically motivated. A federal judge in Detroit peppered a prosecutor with questions Tuesdayto find out whether the investigation that resulted in the Augustindictment of Southfield lawyer Geoffrey Fieger on campaign financecharges was politically motivated. U.S.

In his book, Unequal Protection, Thom Hartman shows how corporations (specifically, railroads) used the 14th Amendment--which ostensibly guaranteed African Americans the same rights other citizens enjoyed--to enshrine the concept of corporate personhood in our legal system. With the passage of the Fourteenth Amendment, the owners of the what werethen America’s largest and most powerful corporations - the railroads -figured they’d finally found a way to reverse Paine’s logic and no longerhave to

Via DK at TPM, all three big telecoms have told Congress to fuck off they can't confirm or deny whether they've been breaking the law by cooperating with the Administration. Three telecommunications companies have declined to tell Congresswhether they gave U.S. intelligence agencies access to Americans' phoneand computer records without court orders, citing White Houseobjections and national security. Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell "formally invokedthe state secrets privilege to prevent AT&T from