When Democrats in Congress consider gun control, it is always through the optics of 1994, the year Republicans recaptured the House of Representatives after 40 years as the minority party. Democrats had passed (by a razor-thin 216-214 margin in the House) a crime bill that included a ban on 19 specific assault weapons. The National […]

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It is a pleasure to set my milk crate down and clamber on top, the better to spread the news of the burgeoning movement to fight climate change—a movement somewhat different from the environmentalism of the last couple of decades. That environmentalism, centered in the big green groups of Washington, D.C., has been noble, hard-working, […]

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In November, Mauritius’ ambassador to the U.S., Somduth Soborun (pictured, right), pled guilty to a misdemeanor charge of failing to pay his domestic worker the federal minimum wage ($7.25 an hour). Authorities said the worker, a Filipina national whom they identified only as C.V., came to the U.S. on a visa to work for Soborun, […]

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Outrage over the Sandy Hook Elementary School massacre may or may not spur any meaningful gun control laws, but you can bet your Crayolas that it will lead to more seven-year-olds getting handcuffed and hauled away to local police precincts. You read that right. Americans may disagree deeply about how easy it should be for […]

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“There can be no doubt that torture is illegal. There are no wartime exceptions for torture, nor is there an exception for prisoners or ‘enemy combatants,’ nor is there an exception for ‘enhanced methods,’” lawyer/journalist Scott Horton wrote in Harper’s in 2008. Prohibition of torture is jus cogens (compelling law), a principle of international law […]

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