Voter registration is rigged against the Libertarian and Green parties!
Remember the Libertarian Party is the party that wants to
re-legalize ALL drugs. And while the Green Party's national
platform doesn't address the issue the Arizona Green Party
does want to legalize marijuana.
Source
Libertarians, Greens ask court to block it, say it's biased vs. them
AZ vote-registration form called unfair
Howard Fischer Capitol Media Services
Posted: Monday, January 2, 2012 12:00 am
PHOENIX - Saying they're victims of discrimination, members of Arizona's Libertarian and Green parties are asking a federal judge to stop the state from using a new voter-registration form.
Attorney David Hardy said would-be voters used to be presented with a form that required them to fill in the name of their party choice.
But the new form mandated by the Legislature this past session provides three choices: Republican, Democrat or other, with that last option including a small space to fill in the choice. Hardy said that is little more than a thinly disguised effort by lawmakers - all of whom are members of one of those named two parties - to suggest to voters that other parties are not important.
He said that is unfair, as the Libertarian and Green parties have met the same legal requirements for state recognition as the Republicans and the Democrats.
Legally speaking, Hardy contends the move is unconstitutional.
"We've got the First Amendment rights involved, the right of people to associate with the party and the party to associate with them," he said. Hardy also said the legislation violates constitutional requirements for equal protection.
"The Legislature is stacked," Hardy said. "The two political parties have an advantage for no reason anyone can understand."
The provision was made part of a larger proposal on changes to state election laws pushed during the session by the Arizona Republican Party.
GOP officials had no immediate response to queries about the reason for pushing the change. But state Sen. Frank Antenori, R-Tucson, who agreed to sponsor the language, said there was a good reason for it: People were leaving the party affiliation box on the old form blank.
What that meant, Antenori said, is they were registered as independent, unaffiliated with any party at all. But he said some people probably really wanted to list themselves with a party but just forgot.
Antenori said the decision was made to have just the two parties with the largest registration listed as a matter of space on the form.
"They didn't want 15 million party boxes on there because there's no room," he said.
Hardy pointed out, though, that while there may be multiple parties, only four have met the standards for legal recognition by the state. Yet the Legislature decided to have only two of them listed.
In his legal filing, he said this slight is more than incidental.
"Even if the thought of registering Green or Libertarian does come to the future voter's mind, he or she may assume that those parties must not be real political parties or do not have ballot access, and thus there is no purpose to registering in them," he said.
Hardy also said the new forms have created problems.
He cited the case of one person who tried to register to vote at the state Motor Vehicle Division, which is permitted under state law. Hardy said that when that person sought to choose the Libertarian Party, state workers refused "in the belief that 'other' referred to independent, and not any third party."
Antenori said no slight was intended. He said that if the Green or Libertarian party members were upset about his proposal, they should have talked to him during the session, before the final vote on the bill, and not waited until eight months later to sue.
But the senator said if it truly is a problem, he is willing to alter the legislation next session.
The new law comes as the two major parties have been losing registration share.
Just five years ago, Republicans made up nearly 40 percent of those registered. That figure is now 33.5 percent.
Democrats watched their share slide from more than 33 percent in 2006 to less than 31 percent now.
The big shift has been not to other parties but to unaffiliated. In fact, at 32.8 percent, there are more independents than Democrats.
US Supreme Court asked to ponder drug dog's sniff
One problem I have with drug dogs is
that the cops who controls the dog often
lies and says the dog found illegal drugs
and uses that as an excuse to illegally
search the suspects.
Sadly you can't put the drug dog on the witness
stand and ask the drug dog if it really detected
drugs, or if the cop who controls the dogs lied
about the dog detecting drugs.
Source
US Supreme Court asked to ponder drug dog's sniff
Associated Press
By CURT ANDERSON
MIAMI (AP) — Franky the drug dog's supersensitive nose is at the heart of a question being put to the U.S. Supreme Court: Does a police dog's sniff outside a house give officers the right to get a search warrant for illegal drugs, or is the sniff an unconstitutional search?
Florida's highest state court has said Franky's ability to detect marijuana growing inside a Miami-area house from outside a closed front door crossed the constitutional line. The state's attorney general wants the Supreme Court to reverse that ruling.
The justices could decide this month whether to take the case, the latest dispute about whether the use of dogs to find drugs, explosives and other illegal or dangerous substances violates the Fourth Amendment protection against illegal search and seizure.
Many court watchers expect the justices will take up the case.
"The Florida Supreme Court adopted a very broad reading of the Fourth Amendment that is different from that applied by other courts. It's an interpretation that a majority of the U.S. Supreme Court will question," said Tom Goldstein, who publishes the widely read SCOTUSblog website and teaches at the Harvard and Stanford law schools.
The case, Florida v. Jardines, is being closely monitored by law enforcement agencies nationwide, which depend on dogs for a wide range of law enforcement duties.
"Dogs can be a police officer's best friend because they detect everything from marijuana or meth labs to explosives," said Kendall Coffey, a former U.S. attorney in Miami now in private practice.
The 8-year-old Franky retired in June after a seven-year career with the Miami-Dade Police Department. He's responsible for the seizure of more than 2.5 tons of marijuana and $4.9 million in drug-contaminated money. And because he's an amiable chocolate Labrador, he was used extensively in airports, sports arenas and other places where people congregate.
"He's a friendly, happy dog," said his former handler, Detective Douglas Bartelt, who kept Franky after he retired. "People don't have fear because of his appearance."
The U.S. Supreme Court has approved drug dog sniffs in several other major cases. Two of those involved dogs that detected drugs during routine traffic stops. In another, a dog found drugs in airport luggage. A fourth involved a drug-laden package in transit.
The Florida case is different because it involves a private residence. The high court has repeatedly emphasized that a home is entitled to greater privacy than cars on the road or a suitcase in an airport. In another major ruling, the justices decided in 2001 that police could not use thermal imaging technology to detect heat from marijuana grow operations from outside a home because the equipment could also detect lawful activity.
"We have said that the Fourth Amendment draws a firm line at the entrance to the house," the court ruled in that case, known as Kyllo v. United States. The justices added that the thermal devices could detect such intimate details as "at what hour each night the lady of the house takes her daily sauna and bath."
It's well-settled that law enforcement officials can walk up to a home and knock on the front door, in hopes that someone will open up and talk. But if a person inside refuses, the officers must get a search warrant — and for that they need evidence of a crime.
On the morning of Dec. 5, 2006, Miami-Dade police detectives and U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration agents set up surveillance outside a house south of the city after getting an anonymous tip that it might contain a marijuana grow operation. Bartelt arrived with Franky. The dog quickly detected the odor of pot at the base of the front door and sat down as he was trained to do.
That sniff was used to get a search warrant from a judge. The house was searched and its lone occupant, Joelis Jardines, was arrested trying to escape out the back door. Officers pulled 179 live marijuana plants from the house, with an estimated street value of more than $700,000.
Jardines, now 39, was charged with marijuana trafficking and grand theft for stealing electricity needed to run the highly sophisticated operation. He pleaded not guilty and his attorney challenged the search, claiming Franky's sniff outside the front door was an unconstitutional law enforcement intrusion into the home.
The trial judge agreed and threw out the evidence seized in the search, but that was reversed by an intermediate appeals court. In April a divided Florida Supreme Court sided with the original judge.
In its petition to the U.S. Supreme Court, state lawyers argue that the Florida Supreme Court's decision conflicts with numerous previous rulings that a dog sniff is not a search.
"A dog sniff of a house reveals only that the house contains drugs, not any other private information about the house or the persons in it," wrote Carolyn Snurkowski, Florida associate deputy attorney general. "A person has no reasonable expectation of privacy in illegal drugs."
The criminal case against Jardines is on hold until the question involving Franky's nose is settled. Meanwhile, Jardines is out on bail following a 2010 arrest for alleged armed robbery and aggravated assault. He pleaded not guilty in that one, as well, and trial is set for Feb. 21.
_____
Follow Curt Anderson on Twitter: http://Twitter.com/Miamicurt
Tax and spend socialist Kyrsten Sinema for Congress
From a Libertarian stand point tax and spend socialist Kyrsten Sinema
is probably the most dangerous politician in the state of Arizona. At
least from the point of stealing your money and creating a socialist police state.
She claims to support the "people", but she knows the cops can help here get
elected so she supports the police state.
A while ago Kyrsten Sinema tried to put a 300 percent tax on medical marijuana,
which means a $50 bag of weed would cost $200 after her 300 percent tax.
Kyrsten Sinema is also an atheist,
but she doesn't have the good morals most atheist have.
Kyrsten Sinema is a thief who will tax anything that moves.
Source
Sinema to resign seat for shot at 9th District
by Rebekah L. Sanders - Jan. 3, 2012 10:55 PM
The Arizona Republic
Democratic state Sen. Kyrsten Sinema announced Tuesday she will resign from the Arizona Legislature to run for Congress in the new 9th District.
The move sets the district up for a potentially heated primary battle among well-known Democrats.
Sinema, who was first elected to the Legislature as a representative in 2004, is the only candidate so far to announce a bid for the 9th District. As drawn on the proposed 2012 Arizona congressional redistricting map, the district includes parts of Paradise Valley, downtown Phoenix, downtown Tempe and west Mesa. It is considered a toss-up between Democrats and Republicans.
A handful of other Democrats have expressed interest. State Sen. David Schapira, D-Tempe, the minority leader, has formed an exploratory committee and said he plans to ask voters at a town hall this Saturday in Tempe if he should run.
Arizona Democratic Party Chairman Andrei Cherny and former congressional candidate Jon Hulburd confirmed Tuesday they also are considering.
Cherny, who ran for state treasurer in 2010, and Hulburd, who ran for Congress against U.S. Rep. Ben Quayle that year, said they were surveying the competition and plan to decide soon.
Sinema lives just outside the 9th District but said she plans to move a few blocks to be within its boundaries. Members of Congress are not required to live in the districts they serve, but it's generally politically advantageous to do so.
If Sinema had run in the district where she now lives, the 7th District, she would have competed with Democratic incumbent Rep. Ed Pastor, whose chances at re-election are strong.
Sinema told the The Arizona Republic that if elected, she plans to focus on creating jobs, helping families keep their homes and supporting education.
"I feel like Washington, D.C., just doesn't get it," she said, blasting Congress for failing to pass a jobs bill in 2011 at a time of record unemployment.
In a video posted Tuesday to her campaign website, kyrsten
sinema.com, Sinema vowed to "stand up to the powerful in Washington."
"Someone needs to speak up for us, for the forgotten middle class and the powerless in our society," she said, adding that as a child her family lived in an abandoned gas station while her stepfather was unemployed.
"I've knocked on 15,000 doors, held hundreds of community meetings, and I understand how tough it is for people to make ends meet," she said.
Sinema said she has a track record of reaching across the aisle, from sponsoring several bills that passed in the Republican-led Legislature to publishing a book on bipartisan coalitions.
The National Republican Congressional Committee issued a news release Tuesday scoffing at Sinema's contention that she's been willing to buck party leaders.
"If elected, she'll just be a rubber-stamp for more of the job-crushing Obama policies she's spent the last three years lobbying for all over Arizona," Daniel Scarpinato, spokesman for the committee, said in the statement.
Sinema, 35, was born in Tucson, teaches in the School of Social Work at Arizona State University and practices law. She served on a White House health-reform task force in 2009.
Sinema's campaign office said she has submitted resignation paperwork.
The Republican field in the 9th District remains unclear, although several names have been floated.
Quayle, a freshman Republican, lives in the 9th but has considered switching to the neighboring 6th District, where voters lean conservative. The 6th District covers Fountain Hills, north Phoenix and parts of Cave Creek, Carefree and Paradise Valley.
Arizona gained a congressional district, for a total of nine, after the 2010 census showed Arizona was the second-fastest-growing state in the nation.
A map with new congressional and legislative districts is being tweaked by the Arizona Independent Redistricting Commission, but it is not expected to change much before it goes to the U.S. Department of Justice for review.
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