“Obama has effectively told the CIA ‘you’re in charge and if you want to go after them we will,’” Scott Horton, a prominent human rights attorney and professor at Columbia Law School, tells MintPress. “There’s also been a lack of independent discretion by the Justice Department; there was much more under Bush than there is under Obama.”
“She does come out of the current administration, and she's overseeing them," said Richard Briffault, a law professor at Columbia University. "You want someone who's willing to go wherever the trail takes her.”
NPR’S MORNING EDITION – February 3
Matthew Waxman, a professor at Columbia University who used to be in charge of detainee affairs in the Bush administration, says the world is watching how these military commission trials play out. "The Obama administration wants to show that the new and improved military commissions are a fair, legitimate and effective option," he says.
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL – February 4
"The issues surrounding frequent-flier miles are a perfect example of how complex the income-tax law can be concerning everyday transactions for virtually every American," says Michael Graetz, a professor at Columbia University Law School and a former top Treasury official.
IT WORLD (blog) – February 5
A few days ago I wrote a post asking whether Facebook was actively helping law enforcement track down bad guys using facial recognition technology. (The answer: Not really.) I had to publish it before I got a response from Eben Moglen, the Columbia law professor and privacy advocate who inspired the post in the first place by telling New York Observer reporter Adrianne Jeffries that Facebook’s PhotoDNA technology was used “to find people for whom any law enforcement agency in the world is looking.”
BLOOMBERG – February 6
Most states don’t have the resources to go it alone and fight the banks in court, said James Tierney, director of Columbia Law School’s National State Attorneys General Program. States such as California that may reject the agreement must decide whether the time and money needed to fight for a better deal is worth it, given that the settlement provides immediate relief for homeowners, he said.
MARKETPLACE FROM AMERICAN PUBLIC MEDIA – February 6
Marketplace from American Public Media interviews James Tierney, the former attorney general for the state of Maine who now runs the National State Attorneys General Program at Columbia University, about state foreclosure settlements.
THE GUARDIAN – February 6
But James Tierney, director of the National State Attorneys General Program at Columbia Law School said the settlement was "a very big deal" and would fundamentally change the accountability of banks.
THE LOS ANGELES TIMES – February 6
Michael Gerrard, director of the Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University, has been advising island nations on their legal quest: Can one country take another country to court over polluting it out of existence? He answered our questions about rising seas, shrinking islands and the law.
THE NATION – February 6
By Patricia Williams
“We see what we want to see,” my grandmother used to say. This insight visited me recently after I ran across the mall chasing a woman I thought was my cousin. It wasn’t, as it turned out, but I didn’t realize that until after I had puffed up behind her, bopped her amiably on the shoulder and cried out, “Boo!”
THE STAR TRIBUNE – February 6
"I don't hold that there is no decision to be made," said Tim Wu, a professor at Columbia Law School and the author of "The Master Switch" and "Who Controls the Internet."
POLITICO – February 7
“Shareholders are clamoring for this information,” said Robert Jackson, an associate professor at Columbia Law School and one of 10 corporate governance experts petitioning the Securities and Exchange Commission to require companies to report all political spending to investors. “They want to make sure companies are spending that money in a way that is consistent with shareholder interests.”
NPR’S IT’S ALL POLITICS – February 7
While the superPAC about-face opens the president up to accusations of hypocrisy, it's more likely to hurt him with Democrats than Republicans, says Nathaniel Persily, a Columbia University professor who specializes in election law.
THE ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH – February 7
"These cases do get settled, even though they may be without real merit," says John Coffee, a securities-law professor at Columbia University. "Companies would rather settle than fight, particularly when they are under a time constraint to get their merger closed."
THE WASHINGTON POST – January 7
Daniel C. Richman, a Columbia law professor and former federal prosecutor, said that in such high-profile cases, “judges are generally aware that there is a public interest that might be different from that of the parties in moving cases forward.”
NEWSDAY – February 8
John Coffee, a securities law expert and professor who teaches at Columbia University School of Law, said the Supreme Court seems unlikely to grant the Wilpons a full hearing. The net equity issue isn't a constitutional issue, said Coffee. He explained that the Supreme Court only takes nonconstitutional issues if they are part of an emergency situation or involve disagreements among a number of federal appeals courts. Neither situation exists with the net equity issue, Coffee said.
THE AMERICAN INTEREST (blog) – February 8
By Jagdish Bhagwati
President Barack Obama infamously killed the multilateral Doha Round last December by instructing his representative at the World Trade Organisation to be a “rejectionist” negotiator. He compounded the folly by instead floating the trans-Pacific Trade Initiative that is conceived in a spirit of confronting China rather than promoting trade, and is also a cynical surrender to self-seeking Washington lobbies that would have made John Kenneth Galbraith blush. Not content with these body blows to the world trading system, which his predecessors had built up over decades of US leadership, Mr Obama pulled off the remarkable feat of making things yet worse with his State of the Union address.
THE HUFFINGTON POST (blog) – February 8
By Katherine Franke
Rainbow flags and corsages were waving high in front of the Stonewall Inn in Greenwich Village last night. There's much to celebrate about the 9th Circuit's ruling issued yesterday confirming the lower court finding that Proposition 8 was unconstitutional. As I noted yesterday and Nan Hunter pointed out as well in her reading of the opinion, the reasoning used by the court minimizes the likelihood that the Supreme Court will take it up on appeal.
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS – February 9
Michael Gerrard, director of the Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University and a member the advisory committee, said the idea is to have a court determination compelling developed nations to control emissions of the greenhouse gases believed to cause global warming in the absence of an international treaty.
THE WASHINGTON POST – February 9
The Supreme Court’s recent actions “have indicated that Section 5 is living on borrowed time,” Columbia University law professor Nathaniel Persily told the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights last week. “Assuming the personnel on the court remains constant, the question is not whether the court will declare Section 5 unconstitutional, but when and how.”
US NEWS’ DEBATE CLUB – February 9
By Katherine Franke and Elizabeth Sepper
“Should Catholic and Other Religious Institutions Have to Cover Birth Control?” The better way to frame the question is: Should employers with a corporate relationship to organized religion be permitted to avoid constitutionally protected health measures that every other employer must follow? Of course not.
