Senate confirms Elana Kagan 63-37 as Supreme Court Justice.

Kagan, Obama’s solicitor general and the former dean of Harvard Law School, will join the high court after its summer recess ends later this year, replacing retiring Justice John Paul Stevens, 90. As expected, the 63-37 vote confirming Kagan, who also served in the Clinton administration, was largely along party lines, with just five Republicans voting with Democrats to confirm her – and one Democrat, Senator Ben Nelson (D-Neb.), voting no.

Full Story: Politico

PHOENIX — A federal judge on Wednesday blocked the most controversial parts of Arizona’s immigration law from taking effect, delivering a last-minute victory to opponents of the crackdown.

The overall law will still take effect Thursday, but without the provisions that angered opponents — including sections that required officers to check a person’s immigration status while enforcing other laws.

The judge also put on hold parts of the law that required immigrants to carry their papers at all times, and made it illegal for undocumented workers to solicit employment in public places. In addition, the judge blocked officers from making warrantless arrests of suspected illegal immigrants.

“Requiring Arizona law enforcement officials and agencies to determine the immigration status of every person who is arrested burdens lawfully-present aliens because their liberty will be restricted while their status is checked,” U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton ruled.

She ruled that the controversial sections should be put on hold until the courts resolve the issues. Other provisions of the law, many of them procedural and slight revisions to existing Arizona immigration statute, will go into effect at 12:01 a.m.

The ruling came just as police were making last-minute preparations to begin enforcement of the law and protesters were planning large demonstrations to speak out against the measure. At least one group planned to block access to federal offices, daring officers to ask them about their immigration status.

The volume of the protests will likely be turned down a few notches because of the ruling by Bolton, a Clinton appointee who suddenly became a crucial figure in the immigration debate when she was assigned the seven lawsuits filed against the Arizona law.

Lawyers for the state contend the law was a constitutionally sound attempt by Arizona — the busiest illegal gateway into the country — to assist federal immigration agents and lessen border woes such as the heavy costs for educating, jailing and providing health care for illegal immigrants.

Opponents argued the law will lead to racial profiling, conflict with federal immigration law and distract local police from fighting more serious crimes. The U.S. Justice Department, civil rights groups and a Phoenix police officer had asked the judge for an injunction to prevent the law from being enforced.

“There is a substantial likelihood that officers will wrongfully arrest legal resident aliens under the new (law),” Bolton ruled. “By enforcing this statute, Arizona would impose a ‘distinct, unusual and extraordinary’ burden on legal resident aliens that only the federal government has the authority to impose.”

The law was signed by Republican Gov. Jan Brewer in April and immediately revived the national debate on immigration, making it a hot-button issue in the midterm elections.

The law has inspired rallies in Arizona and elsewhere by advocates on both sides of the immigration debate. Some opponents have advocated a tourism boycott of Arizona.

It also led an unknown number of illegal immigrants to leave Arizona for other American states or their home countries.

Federal authorities who are trying to overturn the law have argued that letting the Arizona law stand would create a patchwork of immigration laws nationwide that would needlessly complicate the foreign relations of the United States. Federal lawyers said the law is disrupting U.S. relations with Mexico and other countries and would burden the agency that responds to immigration-status inquiries.

Brewer’s lawyers said Arizona shouldn’t have to suffer from America’s broken immigration system when it has 15,000 police officers who can arrest illegal immigrants.

President Bill Clinton’s library in Little Rock, Ark., released about 42,000 pages of documents to the Senate Judiciary Committee, which currently is considering the Kagan nomination.

The documents came primarily from her 1995-96 work in the White House counsel’s office. It’s the second collection released with one more planned before confirmation hearings commence later this month.

One religious-freedom issue included Kagan’s role in drafting an executive order in a much-debated case regarding limits on federal employees talking about religion or displaying religious items in the workplace.

Another case concerned the government requiring a landlord to rent an apartment to an unwed couple, which violated the landlord’s religious beliefs. Read New York Times Story

Source: NewsMax; NY Times

Helen Thomas forced to retire after showing true colors towards Israel

“Helen Thomas announced Monday that she is retiring, effective immediately,” a Hearst Newspapers statement said. “Her decision came after her controversial comments about Israel and the Palestinians were captured on videotape and widely disseminated on the Internet.”

The decision to retire came as Thomas faced rebuke from nearly every corner after video of her remarks during an interview with RabbiLive.com’s Rabbi David Nesenoff emerged online late last week.

Watch Video of Helen Thomas Comments on Jews

“Those remarks were offensive and reprehensible,” Gibbs said during the Monday briefing, adding that Thomas’s remarks “do not reflect certainly most of the people here and certainly not those of the administration.” Thomas did not attend Monday’s briefing and journalists, perhaps sensing the closing of an era, were spotted taking pictures of Thomas’ empty front row.

Thomas, who transitioned from reporter to columnist in 2000 but kept her front-row seat at White House briefings, had come under fire for her statement that Israel should “get the hell out of Palestine” and that Jews in Israeli should return to Germany, Poland, or the US.

Thomas apologized for the comments, saying:

“I deeply regret my comments I made last week regarding the Israelis and the Palestinians. They do not reflect my heart-felt belief that peace will come to the Middle East only when all parties recognize the need for mutual respect and tolerance. May that day come soon.”

The White House Monday called Thomas’ remarks “offensive and reprehensible.”

“Helen Thomas’ comments were indefensible and the White House Correspondents Association board firmly dissociates itself from them,” the WHCA said in a statement. “Many in our profession who have known Helen for years were saddened by the comments, which were especially unfortunate in light of her role as a trail blazer on the White House beat.”

The WHCA statement added that the incident “does revive the issue of whether it is appropriate for an opinion columnist to have a front row seat in the WH briefing room.”

Source: Huffington Post, Politico

The Supreme Court Justices of the United States are John G. Roberts (Chief Justice), John Paul Stevens, Antonin Scalia, Anthony Kennedy, Clarence Thomas, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer, Samuel Alito, Sonia Sotomayor. UPI/Gary Fabiano/PoolUPI/Gary Fabiano/Pool

The high court in a 7-2 judgment reversed a lower court decision that said Congress overstepped its authority in allowing indefinite detentions of considered “sexually dangerous.”

“The statute is a ‘necessary and proper’ means of exercising the federal authority that permits Congress to create federal criminal laws, to punish their violation, to imprison violators, to provide appropriately for those imprisoned and to maintain the security of those who are not imprisoned but who may be affected by the federal imprisonment of others,” said Justice Stephen Breyer, writing the majority opinion.

Five federal prisoners had brought the case. Lead challenger Graydon Comstock was six days before he was to finish a sentence in November 2006 for possession of child pornography when he was certified by the attorney general as “sexually dangerous.” Since then Comstock has been confined at a federal prison in North Carolina

President George W. Bush in 2006 signed the Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act, which authorized the civil commitment of sexually dangerous federal inmates.

The act, named after the son of “America’s Most Wanted” television host John Walsh, was challenged by four men who served prison terms ranging from three to eight years for possession of child pornography or sexual abuse of a minor. Their confinement was supposed to end more than two years ago, but prison officials said there would be a risk of sexually violent conduct or child molestation if they were released.

A fifth man who also was part of the legal challenge was charged with child sex abuse, but declared incompetent to stand trial.

The 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Richmond, Va., ruled last year that Congress overstepped its authority when it enacted a law allowing the government to hold indefinitely people who are considered “sexually dangerous.”

Stephen Breyer

Writing for the majority, Justice Stephen Breyer said Congress’ ability to control the release of dangerous prisoners stems from its broad power under the Constitution to enact laws governing prisons. He added that Congress has long been involved in mental health care for federal prisoners, including their civil commitment.

Most broadly, the court said the power to confine inmates whose sentences have ended arises from Congress’ authority in the Constitution to make laws “necessary and proper” to carry out its powers.

Breyer noted that the law has been applied to only a small fraction of prisoners. He referred to a statement by Solicitor General Elena Kagan at January oral arguments that 105 individuals have been subject to the law, out of more than 188,000 federal inmates.

Elena Kagan

Kagan had argued that the federal government was trying to fill a gap left by the states. “The federal government has mentally ill, seriously dangerous persons in its custody,” Kagan had argued. “It knows that those persons, if released, will commit serious sexual offenses, and it knows too that states are not often in a position to deal with those dangers.”

Kagan was appealing a decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, based in Richmond, that said Congress had overstepped its power in the 2006 law authorizing civil commitment of certain prisoners.

But “we conclude that the Constitution grants Congress legislative power sufficient to enact” this law, Breyer said.

Dissenting Monday were Justices Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas.

Clarence Thomas

Justice Clarence Thomas dissented, saying Congress can only pass laws that deal with the federal powers listed in the Constitution.

Nothing in the Constitution “expressly delegates to Congress the power to enact a civil commitment regime for sexually dangerous persons, nor does any other provision in the Constitution vest Congress or the other branches of the federal government with such a power,” Thomas said.

Thomas was joined in part on his dissent by Justice Antonin Scalia.

Chief Justice John Roberts last year granted an administration request to block the release of up to 77 inmates at a federal prison in North Carolina. These were people whose prison terms for sex offenses were ending. The justice’s order was designed to allow time for the high court to consider the administration’s appeal.

The Adam Walsh Child Protection and Safety Act also establishes a national sex offender registry, increases punishments for some federal crimes against children and strengthens child pornography protections. Those provisions are not being challenged.

State laws allowing civil commitments of sex offenders also are unaffected.

NBC News’s Pete Williams reports:

Kagan, 50, served as the Dean of Harvard Law School from 2003 to 2009. Obama nominated her to serve in her current post as solicitor general early in 2009, and she won Senate confirmation by a vote of 61-31. She is the first woman to serve as solicitor general of the United States.

She was widely viewed as a front-runner when Obama was considering candidates for a Supreme Court opening last year, but the president ultimately chose Sonia Sotomayor for the job.

Unlike the other Supreme Court justices, Kagan has never before served as a federal judge.

Kagan would be the fourth woman ever nominated to the high court and continue a trend of Ivy League-educated lawyers who sit on the bench.

The Coast Guard said the growing slick is 45 miles wide at its broadest point and 100 miles long – about the length of New Jersey’s coastline… Read Full Story

Initially, the law firm contemplated filing a possible Temporary Restraining Order (TRO) in the Transocean Deepwater Horizon explosion that took place on April 20, 2010. A TRO is filed for many reasons – one of which would be to preserve evidence or not to cause spoliation of evidence…

Since an ongoing investigation of great magnitude is already being conducted by The Coast Guard and the Minerals Management Service on possible causes of the explosion, the law firm of Gordon, Elias & Seely, LLP, state that it is foolish to either stop or interfere in this ongoing investigation and filing a TRO would only be done for sensationalism.

Men suffered great fear and mental anguish

So far, based upon the investigation of Gordon, Elias & Seely, LLP, they have determined that there were a series of explosions prior to the main explosion. This means that the people that may have died in the main explosion suffered great, great fear and mental anguish. This further means that the families of these great workers that gave their lives to Transocean have a very large monetary Jones Act claim for what is called conscious pain and suffering. These are very important facts that apparently have been attempted to be suppressed by Transocean and British Petroleum (BP) that will be revealed in the Coast Guard investigation.

Workers are remembered

At 11 am, April, 26,2010, the rigs in the Gulf ceased work, heads bowed, and the whistles blew in remembrance of those who worked on the rig.

Transocean Deepwater Horizon sinking into The Gulf Of Mexico on April 22, 2010

Todd Elias, a Houston maritime lawyer, who is representing Tracy Kleppinger, the wife of worker Karl Kleppinger Jr. of Natchez, Miss., said his client was told by rig owner Transocean Ltd. that her husband Karl Kleppinger, Jr is considered deceased. Attorney, Steve Gordon, said the company has sent grievers to be with Tracy Kleppinger. 

“Right now we’re trying to find anybody who has any information, anybody who might have seen him and what happened,” said R. Todd Elias, the family’s attorney. “The family would like to have some information about what happened to him, and so far Transocean isn’t telling us anything. They just tell us they don’t know.”

In response, the law firm of Gordon, Elias and Seely LLP., has filed a wrongful death lawsuit Friday afternoon in Harris County, Texas, against Transocean and BP, which leased the rig.

Carolyn Kemp, the grandmother of missing worker Wyatt Kemp of Jonesville, La., also said today that Kemp’s family had been informed that he was dead.

At a news conference Friday afternoon, a vice president of Transocean, Adrian Rose, confirmed that the company has been calling next of kin but denied that loved ones have been told the workers are deceased.

“We can’t be definitive yet, not until search and rescue efforts are completed,” Rose said.

The U.S. Coast Guard said Friday it has suspended the active search for 11 missing crew members of the Transocean Ltd.

None of the 11 missing crew have been found and remain missing to this date.

On April 22, 2010, the Deepwater Horizon sank to the bottom of the Gulf of Mexico

An explosion rocked an offshore oil drilling platform, sending a column of fire into the sky and touching off a frantic search at sea for at least 11 originally reported missing. Most of the 126 workers on the rig Deepwater Horizon were believed to have escaped safely after the explosion that happened about 10 p.m. Tuesday, April 20, 2010.

Photo Courtesy: Dan McDonald - Coast Guard vessels try to extinguish the fire on DEEPWATER HORIZON. These pictures are believed to have been taken by a nearby Chevron worker

Rear Adm. Mary Landry, commander of the Coast Guard’s 8th district headquarters; David Hayes, deputy secretary for the U.S. Department of the Interior; Adrian Rose, vice president of Transocean; and David Rainey and vice president of BP were at the conference to answer questions…

Unfortunately there is no news on the whereabouts of the missing workers.

“We have no idea where the 11 unaccounted-for personnel are,” Landry said.

This is not the news that the families, who are anxiously awaiting news of their missing loved ones, wanted to hear.

The Coast Guard was notified of the fire at 10 p.m and told that platform workers were evacuating, she said.

There were 126 people on the unit, 11 of whom are still unaccounted for. The case is “an ongoing rescue case,” Landry said.

Rose said the cause of the accident is still unknown.

There were six BP workers on the rig at the time of the accident and 29 Transocean. The rest were “third-party personnel,” Rose said. Three of the injured workers are critical, he said.

He said Transocean is “deeply saddened” by the event. He gave the family response-team number for families of workers on the rig: 832.587.5110.

Rainey said BP’s primary focus for now is supporting the Coast Guard’s rescue effort and provide support for the injured.

Rainey said any pollution is minor at this time.

MAP

Deputy Interior Secretary Hayes said Interior has set up a command center here to respond to the accident.

“Continuing the search and rescue mission” is the primary focus now, Hayes said.

An oil-spill response team has also been set up, he said.

Adm. Landry said the search and rescue will continue through the night if necessary and the Coast Guard has the equipment it needs to search during dark or foggy conditions.

Conditions for search-and-rescue are good, Landry said. Most of the spilled fuel is burning off and is still burning as of 3 p.m.

Platform crews are still on their way in to shore and have not been interviewed about the incident, one of the company officials said.

Adm. Landry said “tremendous resources” can be brought to bear in response to this accident.

Nola.com contributed to this story.