¶ The Paragraph

The U.S. Supreme Court last week declined to hear a case to stop President Bush’s domestic warrantless wiretapping, and let stand a 2-1 Appeals Court ruling that threw out the case on a technicality—a catch-22.x20 The ACLU brought the case on behalf of some journalists, scholars and lawyers, who claim that the specter of [...]

The management of the Sequoia Voting Systems company willfully sent lousy punch cards to Florida for its 2000 general election.x10 Last August, HDNet’s Dan Rather Reports aired that story, which gives an answer to why so many card ballots did not have a single, clean punch for president.x11 Sequoia management switched from their [...]

“I am Dekanawidah and with the Five Nations’ Confederate Lords I plant the Tree of Great Peace.“x1 So begins the Great Law of Peace, the constitution of the Iroquois Confederacy, a union of tribes centered south of Lake Ontario that thrived for 600 years up to the formation of the United States. The preamble [...]

“In August, I think it was … [National Intelligence Director] Mike McConnell came in and said, we have some new information. He didn’t tell me what the information was …” (2007-12-04)x60 President Bush uttered that statement last week, claiming ignorance about the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) finding that Iran has had no nuclear [...]

2007-12-07: I saw Comet Holmes again the night before last, one of the few clear nights during this cloudy late autumn near Erie’s southern shore. Being far enough from city lights to see the milk of the Milky Way, I could just make out the comet by naked eye. But through binoculars, I [...]