Patriot Act national security letter ruling

"John Doe, American Civil Liberties Union, and American Civil Liberties Union Foundation, v. Alberto Gonzales, Robert Mueller, et al., US District Court for the Southern District of New York, September 6, 2007 [ruling that national security letters demanding private information and imposing gag orders on recipients are unconstitutional without judicial review]." Source: ACLU [via U of Pittsburgh School of Law]

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Nation's Real Estate Slump Hits Wealthy Areas

"Public assessments of the nation's economy have fallen to a two-year low, and the nation's economic outlook remains relatively gloomy. In particular, faced with a steady stream of negative news about the U.S. housing market, Americans are substantially less inclined than they were even a few months ago to say they expect home prices to increase over the next few years. People living in areas with the most expensive homes and middle-income Americans are particularly likely to say that future home prices will decline." Source: Pew Research for People and the press.

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Burning Crosses, Hangman's Nooses, and the Like

"Almost half of the states outlaw cross burning with the intent to threaten as such. A few of these statutes cover the display of hangman's nooses and other symbols of intimidation as well. Moreover, the same misconduct also frequently falls under more general state prohibitions on coercion, terroristic threats, harassment, or hate crimes. Some of these laws feature a hate crime element without which conviction is not possible; others do not. In either case, there are obvious first amendment implications. The Supreme Court has explained that not all speech, particular expressive conduct, is protected by the First Amendment. However, in R.A.V. v. St. Paul, it held cross burning with the intent to annoy was protected and did not come within the "fighting words" category of unprotected speech. Shortly thereafter, in Black v. Virginia, the Court held that cross burning with the intent to convey a true threat was not protected. Some of the Justices noted another difference between the two cases: the ordinance in R.A.V. had a hate crime element -- the offense had to be motivated by racial or some other discriminatory animus; the statute in Black had no such element. In years since Black was announced, the lower courts have continued to recognize true threats as unprotected, but have also continued to analyze challenges to threat statutes under the First Amendment's overbreadth doctrine and the vagueness doctrine of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments' due process clauses. These laws have generally survived such challenges, although an imprecisely worded statute has fallen victim to a vagueness attack upon occasion." Source: Congressional Research Service

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Spending by Employers on Health Insurance: A Data Brief

"To attract and maintain a skilled workforce, many businesses provide health insurance and other benefits for their employees. As the cost of health insurance rises, employers face a growing challenge paying for benefits while managing labor costs to succeed in a competitive market. All types of businesses report problems, including both small businesses and firms with thousands of employees and retirees. Despite concerns about the cost of benefits, small and large employers together provide health coverage for most Americans, about 60% of the population in 2006.1 But as the amount that employers pay for health insurance has been increasing -- both absolutely and as a share of labor costs -- the percent of the population covered has been decreasing. To describe employer contributions for health insurance, this report presents data from two employer surveys. The first, conducted by the Kaiser Family Foundation and the Health Research and Educational Trust, provides information on premiums for employer-sponsored health insurance. The second, from the Department of Labor, provides information on employer costs for employee compensation, including costs for wages and salaries, health insurance, and other benefits." Source: Congressional Research Service

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Regional Foundations for Internationalism in the Ancient Near East: The Case of Canaan

Abstract: "In the early 15th through 13th centuries BCE, the world of the Near East, from the Mediterranean to modern day Iran, was linked together in what historians today call the First International Age. Correspondence from that period found at El Amarna in Egypt and other sites in Mesopotamia and Anatolia details the diplomatic and economic exchanges between the “Great Powers” of the time (Babylon, Assyria, Mittani, Hatti, and Egypt), and contains letters from the Egyptian vassal kingdoms in the Levant, known as Canaan.

The complex diplomatic interchanges and active economic trade during this period were possible because of the status of Canaan as a series of semi-autonomous vassal states under the Egyptian empire. Canaan acted as the economic center for the entire region, linking the goods and kingdoms of southwest Asia, Africa, and southeastern Europe into a single trading system. Though under the nominal control of Egypt, Canaan served as neutral territory for all the powers, enabling complex political and diplomatic interchange throughout the region.

This paper explores the conditions within Canaan that allowed this system of exchange to flourish, and will show that a number of military, political, and cultural factors in Canaan, which were cultivated by the Egyptians, allowed the region to act as an international territory facilitating trade and political interaction between the Great Powers." Source: University of California World History Workshop.[via eScholarship Repository]

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Becoming Less Separate?: School Desegregation, Justice Department, and the Pursuit of Unitary Status

"The purpose of this report is to examine the effect that this increase in the number of school districts obtaining unitary status has had on the racial balance of schools that were previously under court order. In other words, do school districts tend to revert to racial clustering—as some would say, do they “resegregate”—after they are released from judicial supervision? Justice Stephen Breyer recently raised this very issue, when he claimed that many school districts are maintaining or extending their integration efforts because they fear what Justice Breyer calls “the evident risk of a return to school systems that are in fact (though not in law) resegregated . . . .”1 Justice Breyer’s argument implicitly raises an important question, which this report attempts to answer: Does judicial supervision appear, in the aggregate, to maintain racial integration and does that integration tend to erode as court orders are lifted?" Source: U.S. Commission on Civil Rights

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Health Care Cost and Access Challenges Persist

"Little has changed in local health care markets since 2005 to break the cycle of rising costs, falling insurance coverage and widening access inequities, according to initial findings from the Center for Studying Health System Change’s (HSC) 2007 site visits to 12 nationally representative metropolitan communities. As intense competition among hospitals and physicians for profitable specialty services continues, employers and health plans are looking to consumers to take more responsibility for medical costs, lifestyle choices and treatment decisions. While consumer-directed health plans have not gained widespread adoption, other developments—including a heightened emphasis on prevention and wellness, along with nascent provider cost and quality information—are advancing health care consumerism. However, concerns exist about whether these efforts will slow cost growth enough to keep care affordable or whether the growing problem of affordability will derail efforts to decrease the rising number of uninsured Americans and stymie meaningful health care reform." Source: Center for Studying Health System Change

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Male Adolescent Athletes More Likely to Be Aggressors

Press Release: "For years, proponents of high school athletics have pointed out the positive aspects of youth sports, such as increased bonds to school, self-esteem, achievement, competition, and fair play. However, youth sports have also been marred with high-profile accounts of brawling, sexual assault, and bullying." Source: American Sociological Review, Oct. 2007 [via Newswise]
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Matching Owner-Managers' Cognitive Style and Organizational Demands in Family Firms

"Based on survey responses from 159 owners-managers in small, family firms, we examined the association between specific individual characteristics, firm characteristics, and the individual psychosocial outcomes of satisfaction, intentions to exit, and perceived fit. Hierarchical regression analyses indicated higher satisfaction, lower intentions to exit, and higher perceived fit for owner-managers whose dominant decision-making style complemented the levels of formalization in their firms. More specifically, the results suggested that owner-managers with intuitive decision-making styles were better fitted to the demands corresponding to less structured firm environments than their analytic counterparts. The theoretical and practical implications of these findings are discussed." Source: Social Science Research Network

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The Heart Has its Reasons: Examining the Strange Persistence of the American Death Penalty

"The debate about the future of the death penalty often focuses on whether its supporters are animated by instrumental or expressive values, and if the latter, what values the penalty does in fact express, where those values originated, and how deeply entrenched they are. In this article I argue that a more explicit recognition of the emotional sources of support for and opposition to the death penalty will have salutary consequences for the clarity of the debate. The focus on emotional variables reveals that the demarcation between instrumental and expressive values is porous; both types of values are informed (or uninformed) by fear, outrage, compassion, selective empathy and other emotional attitudes. More fundamentally, though history, culture and politics are essential aspects of the discussion, the resilience of the death penalty cannot be adequately understood when the affect is stripped from explanations for its support. Ultimately, the death penalty will not die without a societal change of heart. " Source: Social Science Research Network

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Blockbuster Culture's Next Rise or Fall: The Impact of Recommender Systems on Sales Diversity

\"This paper examines the effect of recommender systems on the diversity of sales. Two anecdotal views exist about such effects. Some believe recommenders help consumers discover new products and thus increase sales diversity. Others believe recommenders only reinforce the popularity of already popular products. This paper is a first attempt to reconcile these seemingly incompatible views. We explore the question in two ways. First, modeling recommender systems analytically allows us to explore their path dependent effects. Second, turning to simulation, we increase the realism of our results by combining choice models with actual implementations of recommender systems." Source: Social Science Research Network

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Never ending Friending: A consumer study of social networking

"In summary, we learned that social networking is a quantum change in how we interact – with each other, with bands and brands, and with the entire media landscape. We also learned there are indeed a set of best practices that will govern behavior in this
new world." Source: Forrester Research

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Ahmadinejad Visit Draws Large Audience

Burma Protests Barely Register with Public

"Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s visit to the U.S. drew a large news audience last week. Aside from the Iraq war it was the most closely followed news story, with 23% of the public following the story very closely, and 14% listing it as the single news story they followed most closely. Ahmadinejad’s visit, as well as broader issues relating to U.S.-Iranian relations, was the most heavily covered news story of the week. Fully 13% of the national newshole was devoted to this story." Source: Pew Research Center for people and the press

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Journalists' Privilege: Overview of the Law and Legislation in the 109th and 110th Congresses

"In Branzburg v. Hayes, the Supreme Court wrote journalists claim "that to gather news it is often necessary to agree either not to identify the source of information published or to publish only part of the facts revealed, or both; that if the reporter is nevertheless forced to reveal these confidences to a grand jury the source so identified and other confidential sources of other reporters will be measurably deterred from furnishing publishable information, all to the detriment of the free flow of information protected by the First Amendment." The Court held, nonetheless, that the First Amendment did not provide even a qualified privilege for journalists to refuse "to appear and testify before state or federal grand juries." The only situation it mentioned in which the First Amendment would allow a reporter to refuse to testify was in the case of "grand jury investigations ... instituted or conducted other than in good faith.... Official harassment of the press undertaken not for purposes of law enforcement but to disrupt a reporter's relationship with his news sources would have no justification." Though the Supreme Court concluded that the First Amendment does not provide a journalists' privilege in grand jury proceedings, 49 states have adopted a journalists' privilege in various types of proceedings; 33 have done so by statute, and 16 by court decision. Journalists have no privilege in federal proceedings. On July 6, 2005, a federal district court in Washington, DC, found Judith Miller of the New York Times in contempt of court for refusing to cooperate in a grand jury investigation relating to the leak of the identity of an undercover CIA agent. The court ordered Ms. Miller to serve time in jail. Ms. Miller spent 85 days in jail. She secured her release only after her informant, I. Lewis Libby, gave her permission to reveal his identity. Congress has considered creating a journalists' privilege for federal proceedings, and bills to adopt a journalists' privilege have been introduced in the 109th and 110th Congresses, in both the House and the Senate. These bills generally would provide for a more narrow privilege than the privileges provided by state laws."

Source: Congressional Research Service

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Congressional Investigations of the Department of Justice, 1920-2007: History, Law, and Practice

Legislative oversight is most commonly conducted through congressional budget, authorization, appropriations, confirmation, and investigative processes, and, in rare instances, through impeachment. But the adversarial, often confrontational, and sometimes high profile nature of congressional investigations sets it apart from the more routine, accommodative facets of the oversight process experienced in authorization, appropriations, or confirmation exercises. While all aspects of legislative oversight share the common goals of informing Congress so as to best accomplish its tasks of developing legislation, monitoring the implementation of public policy, and disclosing to the public how its government is performing, the inquisitorial process also sustains and vindicates Congress' role in our constitutional scheme of separated powers and checks and balances. The rich history of congressional investigations from the failed St. Clair expedition in 1792 through Teapot Dome, Watergate, Iran-Contra, Whitewater, and the current ongoing inquiries into the removal and replacement of United States Attorneys, has established, in law and practice, the nature and contours of congressional prerogatives necessary to maintain the integrity of the legislative role in that constitutional scheme. A review of the historical experience and legal rulings pertinent to congressional access to information regarding the law enforcement activities of the Department of Justice indicates that in the last 85 years Congress has consistently sought and obtained deliberative prosecutorial memoranda, and the testimony of line attorneys, FBI field agents and other subordinate agency employees regarding the conduct of open and closed cases in the course of innumerable investigations of Department of Justice activities. Source: Congressional Research Service, Library of Congress

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Crime, Violence, Discipline, and Safety in U.S. Public Schools, Findings from the School Survey on Crime and Safety

"This First Look report uses data from the 2005–06 School Survey on Crime and Safety (SSOCS) to examine a range of issues dealing with school crime and safety, such as the frequency of school crime and violence, disciplinary actions, and school practices related to the prevention and reduction of crime and safety. SSOCS is the primary source of school-level data on crime and safety for NCES. Since 1999, it has been administered three times to the principals of a nationally representative sample of public primary, middle, high, and combined schools." Source: National Center for Education Statistics

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What Can Studies of e-Learning Teach Us About e-Research? Some Findings from Digital Library Research

Abstract: e-Research is intended to facilitate collaboration through distributed access to content, tools, and services. Lessons about collaboration are extracted from the findings of two large, long-term digital library research projects. Both the Alexandria Digital Earth Prototype Project (ADEPT) and the Center for Embedded Networked Sensing (CENS) project on data management leverage scientific research data for use in teaching. Two forms of collaboration were studied: (1) direct, in which faculty work together on research projects; and (2) indirect or serial, in which faculty use or contribute content to a common pool, such as teaching resources, concepts and relationships, or research data. Five aspects of collaboration in e-Research are discussed: (1) disciplinary factors, (2) incentives to adopt e-Learning and e-Research technologies, (3) user roles, (4) information sharing, and (5) technical requirements. Collaboration varied by research domain in both projects, and appears partly to be a function of the degree of instrumentation in data collection. Faculty members were more interested in tools to manage their own research data than in tools to facilitate teaching. They also were more reflective about their research than teaching activities. The availability of more content, tools, and services to incorporate primary data in teaching was only a minimal incentive to use these resources. Large investments in a knowledge base of scientific concepts and relationships for teaching did not result in re-use by other faculty during the course of the project. Metadata requirements for research and for teaching vary greatly, which further complicates the transfer of resources across applications. Personal digital libraries offer a middle ground between private control and public release of content, which is a promising direction for the design of digital libraries that will facilitate collaboration in e-Research."

Source: UCLA Graduate School of Education & Information Studies. Publications.

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Presidential Claims of Executive Privilege: History, Law, Practice and Recent Developments

Presidential claims of a right to preserve the confidentiality of information and documents in the face of legislative demands have figured prominently, though intermittently, in executive-congressional relations since at least 1792. Few such interbranch disputes over access to information have reached the courts for substantive resolution, the vast majority achieving resolution through political negotiation and accommodation. In fact, it was not until the Watergate-related lawsuits in the 1970's seeking access to President Nixon's tapes that the existence of a presidential confidentiality privilege was judicially established as a necessary derivative of the President's status in our constitutional scheme of separated powers. Of the eight court decisions involving interbranch or private information access disputes, three have involved Congress and the Executive but only one of these resulted in a decision on the merits. The Nixon and post-Watergate cases established the broad contours of the presidential communications privilege. Under those precedents, the privilege, which is constitutionally rooted, could be invoked by the President when asked to produce documents or other materials or information that reflect presidential decisionmaking and deliberations that he believes should remain confidential. If the President does so, the materials become presumptively privileged. The privilege, however, is qualified, not absolute, and can be overcome by an adequate showing of need. Finally, while reviewing courts have expressed reluctance to balance executive privilege claims against a congressional demand for information, they have acknowledged they will do so if the political branches have tried in good faith but failed to reach an accommodation. However, until the District of Columbia Circuit's 1997 ruling in In re Sealed Case(Espy), and 2004 decision in Judicial Watch v. Department of Justice, these judicial decisions had left important gaps in the law of presidential privilege. Among the more significant issues left open included whether the President has to have actually seen or been familiar with the disputed matter; whether the presidential privilege encompasses documents and information developed by, or in the possession of, officers and employees in the departments and agencies of the Executive Branch; whether the privilege encompasses all communications with respect to which the President may be interested or is it confined to presidential decisionmaking and, if so, is it limited to any particular type of presidential decisionmaking; and precisely what kind of demonstration of need must be shown to justify release of materials that qualify for the privilege. The unanimous panel in Espy, and the subsequent reaffirmation of the principles articulated in Espy by Judicial Watch, authoritatively addressed each of these issues in a manner that may have drastically altered the future legal playing field in resolving such disputes. Source: Congressional Research Service

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Public Expresses Mixed Views of Islam, Mormonism

Benedict XVI Viewed Favorably But Faulted on Religious Outreach

The Muslim and Mormon religions have gained increasing national visibility in recent years. Yet most Americans say they know little or nothing about either religion's practices, and large majorities say that their own religion is very different from Islam and the Mormon religion.

A new national survey reveals some notable similarities, as well as major differences, in the ways that Americans view these faiths and their followers. Public impressions of both religions are hazy – 58% say they know little or nothing about Islam's practices, while 51% have little or no awareness of the precepts and practices of Mormonism. The number of people who say they know little or nothing about Islam has changed very little since 2001. Source: Pew Research

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Extraterritorial Application of American Criminal Law

Crime is usually territorial. It is a matter of the law of the place where it occurs. Nevertheless, a surprising number of American criminal laws apply outside of the United States. Application is generally a question of legislative intent, expressed or implied. In either case, it most often involves crimes committed aboard a ship or airplane, crimes condemned by international treaty, crimes committed against government employees or property, or crimes that have an impact in this country even if planned or committed in part elsewhere. Although the crimes over which the United States has extraterritorial jurisdiction may be many, so are the obstacles to their enforcement. For both practical and diplomatic reasons, criminal investigations within another country require the acquiescence, consent, or preferably the assistance, of the authorities of the host country. The United States has mutual legal assistance treaties with several countries designed to formalize such cooperative law enforcement assistance. Searches and interrogations carried out on our behalf by foreign officials, certainly if they involve Americans, must be conducted within the confines of the Fourth and Fifth Amendments. And the Sixth Amendment imposes limits upon the use in American criminal trials of depositions taken abroad. Our recently negotiated extradition treaties address some of the features of our earlier agreements which complicate extradition for extraterritorial offenses, i.e., dual criminality requirements, reluctance to recognize extraterritorial jurisdiction, and exemptions on the basis of nationality or political offenses. To further facilitate the prosecution of federal crimes with extraterritorial application Congress has enacted special venue, statute of limitations, and evidentiary statutes. Source: Congressional Research Service


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