When Is It OK to Take People's DNA Without Their Consent?

If you're walking down the street and a police officer wants to swab your cheek for a DNA sample, you can refuse. But if you're convicted of a felony, you can't. At what point in the criminal process do you lose that right?

In California, until last week, the answer was the moment you were arrested for a felony. But a California state court has struck down the state statute that allowed such DNA collection, saying the measure "unreasonably intrudes on such arrestees' expectation of privacy and is invalid under the Fourth Amendment of the United States Constitution."

The decision comes at a crucial time in the legal battle over DNA evidence: Last summer, a three-judge panel on the federal Ninth Circuit heard arguments about California's law and has yet to issue its opinion. This fall, the circuit will sit en banc -- that means all of the judges not just three of them -- to decide whether a very similar federal law is constitutional. Another circuit court has already decided that it is. If the two circuits disagree (or even if they don't), the issue could come before the Supreme Court soon.

Rick Scott Pays $360 a Year for State Health Insurance

Florida's anti-Obamacare governor and his tea party allies in the legislature pay less for state-funded health insurance than janitors, cops, or teachers.

Last year, political neophyte Rick Scott spent $73 million of his own money to bring the tea party's anti-government, pro-privatization agenda to the Florida governor's office. Today, the former executive pays just $30 a month for health care—and lets taxpayers cover the rest.

The governor, a proud bearer of the Republican Party's deregulation standard, has spent his first half-year in office decrying government waste: He's laid off thousands of Sunshine State employees, slashed their benefits, turned down (most of) the federal government's health care dollars, and put extra financial pressure on Florida retirees and Medicaid recipients. But Scott and his dependents pay one-fifth what a janitor in the state Capitol pays for health insurance... and less than 3 percent of what a retired state trooper pays for life-saving coverage.

Michele Bachmann's Auschwitz Warning

In a 2002 film highlighting her work as an education activist, Michele Bachmann endorsed the argument of her colleague, Michael Chapman, who claimed that state and federal education reforms were leading the United States toward its own Holocaust. Minnesota's new curriculum standards, Bachmann contended, were going to "undermine our freedom and undermine our national sovereignty" and turn children into "global citizens." The "brave new world" Chapman warned about, she said, wouldn't be far behind.

Before Bachmann served in the Minnesota state Senate, led the tea party caucus in the House of Representatives, or ran for president, she worked as an education activist with a conservative group called the Maple River Education Coalition (MREC). Together with Chapman, Bachmann criss-crossed Minnesota, speaking to church groups and warning them about the dire consequences of state and federal education reform.

In the middle of all of this, Bachmann and Chapman made a movie.

Guinea Pig Kids II is not, as its name might suggest, a B-list horror film. The impetus for the film was the Profile of Learning, a set of state curriculum standards adopted by Republican Gov. Arne Carlson's administration in 1998. To Bachmann and Chapman, the standards were nefarious and part of a a far-reaching globalist plot.

Harper lashes out at critics of Canada-Colombia free-trade deal

BOGOTA — Critics of free trade with Colombia who talk about human rights are really more concerned about protectionism, Stephen Harper claims.

That was the prime minister’s blunt message Wednesday as he stood beside his Colombian counterpart on the eve of a historic free-trade deal coming into effect.

“We can’t block the progress of a country like this for protectionist reasons, and you trying to use human rights as a front for doing that,” Harper said in Colombia’s presidential palace after being asked about critics who cite human-rights concerns in dealing with the country.

The NDP opposed the Conservative government’s signing of a free-trade agreement with Colombia in 2008 and tried to block the deal. But the deal passed and it takes effect Monday.

Kenney gets into letter-writing scrap with Amnesty International

OTTAWA—Jason Kenney’s scornful rebuke of Amnesty International for criticizing his government’s snitch line for “war criminals” dodging deportation orders was laced with an especially acidic tone.

Even for a tough-on-crime Conservative immigration minister.

On ministerial and MP letterhead, Kenney’s office on Tuesday released an “open letter” to the advocacy organization, slamming it for what Kenney calls its “ridiculous” suggestions the government was out of line.

The Untransformational President - Barack Obama hoped to elevate American politics. Instead, our politics may destroy his presidency.

Why isn’t Barack Obama tougher? During the week that he signed a debt deal in which the Republicans took him to the cleaners, markets tanked, and U.S. debt got hit with a historic and disastrous downgrade, several answers were bruited. It’s political: he’s in thrall to polls telling him that accommodation is what independent voters want. It’s ideological: he’s in fact (say some liberals) an aggressive moderate who’s perfectly fine with massive spending cuts. It’s psychological or biological: he just doesn’t have the tough-guy gene.

All these factors are present to varying degrees. But let me offer a different explanation—one that’s a little deeper. The problem rests in the realm of political philosophy. Obama has beliefs about democratic governance, and about himself as president, that dictate his behavior in battles like the debt-ceiling brawl. These beliefs were a big part of what made him so inspirational to so many people before he won the 2008 election, but they have served him—and his voters, and the country—poorly since he took office, and especially since the Republicans won control of the House of Representatives.

Toronto seeks bids on private trash collection earlier than expected

Private garbage collectors could be replacing municipal workers on downtown Toronto streets as soon as next summer, a new timeline that puts the city six months ahead of schedule in its bid to contract out garbage services, and adds a degree of tension to looming labour negotiations.

The city issued its call for bids on the project late Wednesday afternoon. It’s looking for a company to collect residential and commercial waste between Yonge Street and the Etobicoke border for a seven-year period at a cost of no more than $25,975,030.

Tory MP who fought long gun registry chairs top-secret committee to vet Supreme Court candidates

Prime Minister Stephen Harper appointed Conservative MP Candice Hoeppner to the panel last Friday. 'I’m assuming the Conservatives are doing it to increase her profile and all the work she did on the gun registry,' says NDP MP Joe Comartin.

PARLIAMENT HILL—Prime Minister Stephen Harper has positioned a high-profile Manitoba Conservative MP who led a Parliamentary battle against the federal long-gun registry as the chair of a top-secret panel of MPs that will vet candidates to fill two crucial vacancies on the Supreme Court of Canada.

Slave Lake Fire Donations Found In Calgary Dump

CALGARY - A heartbroken Calgary business woman admitted Wednesday that it was clothing, bedding and toys she had gathered for wildfire victims that ended up in a city landfill.

Melissa Gunning said her eco-friendly baby container business, Wean Green, started collecting items after a friend lost her home in May to the raging wildfire that destroyed a good portion of Slave Lake, Alta.

She said the public's response was overwhelming. She sent two semi-trailer loads of donated goods to Slave Lake, but when the community indicated it didn't need anymore items, she was stuck with two large storage lockers full of donations.

Double dumb-down

It’s safe to say that if councillor Doug Ford has a summer reading list, Margaret Atwood isn’t on it.

As the mayor’s big brother said during his recent very public set-to with the celebrated author over possible library closures, he wouldn’t know Atwood if he passed her on the street.

Media types had great fun with that one, and with Ford’s remark that he’d prefer a few more Tim Hortons to bibliothèques in his ward. Funny.