February 27, 2016

Scalia Took Dozens of Trips Funded by Private Sponsors

WASHINGTON — Antonin Scalia was the longest-tenured justice on the current Supreme Court and the country’s most prominent constitutionalist. But another quality also set him apart: Among the court’s members, he was the most frequent traveler, to spots around the globe, on trips paid for by private sponsors.

When Justice Scalia died two weeks ago, he was staying, again for free, at a West Texas hunting lodge owned by a businessman whose company had recently had a matter before the Supreme Court.

Though that trip has brought new attention to the justice’s penchant for travel, it was in addition to the 258 subsidized trips that he took from 2004 to 2014. Justice Scalia went on at least 23 privately funded trips in 2014 alone to places like Hawaii, Ireland and Switzerland, giving speeches, participating in moot court events or teaching classes. A few weeks before his death, he was in Singapore and Hong Kong.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/27/us/politics/scalia-led-court-in-taking-trips-funded-by-private-sponsors.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

February 10, 2016

From Jay Heck on Political Friends:

"Friends, earlier this evening the State Senate passed, along partisan lines, hyper-partisan legislation -- Senate Bill 295 -- which eliminates the ability for organizations like the League of Women Voters, the NAACP, Voces del la Frontera and even city and municipal clerks to be able to conduct effective voter registration drives. It also stipulates that mailed absentee ballots not received by election day will not be counted! Currently, absentee ballots that have a post mark on election day are counted. So that means thousands of absentee ballots will be disqualified! While SB 295 does provide for some online voter registration -- a positive thing -- the obvious hyper-partisan voter suppression provisions -- added in secret and without a public hearing -- render this legislation utterly unsupportable. Both State Senator Devin LeMahieu (R-Oostburg), the primary author of this abomination, and State Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald (R-Juneau,) were both utterly incapable of being able to defend the legislation and simply called for partisan votes to defeat Democratic amendments that would have improved the bill. A number of Democratic State Senators were outstanding in their effective assault on this obviously hyper-partisan voter suppression measure: Julie Lassa of Stevens Point, Tim Carpenter of Milwaukee, Mark Miller of Monona, Jon Erpenbach of Middleton, Fred Risser of Madison, Janet Bewley of Ashland and Dave Hansen of Green Bay. Please thank them for their heroic effort. Contact every Republican State Senator and tell them how wrong they are on this. And contact your State Representative and urge they vote against this when it comes to the Assembly for a vote in the very near future. Never give up and never surrender!"

It is a closed group on FB buT You could join. https://www.facebook.com/groups/793448480706917/?fref=nf