Two weeks after the release of Amnesty Intl’s new report on the use of prolonged solitary confinement inside California’s ‘Security Housing Units’ (SHUs), entitled "The Edge of Endurance: Conditions in California’s Security Housing Units," prisoners initiated another hunger strike, with 500 participants statewide. In this new interview, Tessa Murphy speaks about her visit to California SHUs and Amnesty's report based on the visit. Our introduction features key excerpts from Amnesty's report detailing how Amnesty thinks the CA authorities have not done enough in response the the 2011 hunger strike.

Lawrence O'Donnell talks about how presidential debates can be improved. He speaks with the knowledge of an insider, having both written scripts for The West Wing and having been a Senate staffer.

The Washington Post leads the pack when it comes to generating what scientists term a “moral panic” about budget deficits. As part of that effort they generated the series of myths that Paul Ryan was “serious,” “courageous,” and “expert” about “solving” the “deficit crisis.” The newspaper’s theme is that anyone who doesn’t fall for their effort to create a moral panic is not “serious” and should be ignored.

A member of the NW Greens who went by the name Astrique posted an extensive list of reasons as to why a vote for Obama was a good idea. The list comes out to around five pages in my word processor, so I posted it at http://www.prawnworks.net/Why-Im-Voting-Obama-by-Astrique.html. Robert Small objected to it and posted an extensive reply.
Also, we found this piece to interesting and relevant/

Mumia Abu-Jamal, the internationally recognized American political prisoner, thwarted a Philadelphia judge’s secretive court order that could have eliminated his future appeal rights when he filed a last- minute motion on August 23rd challenging that order sentencing him to life-without-parole.

Most supporters and detractors of Abu-Jamal had been expecting the formal conversion of his controversial death sentence to life-without-parole in the wake of a federal appeals court’s second and final rejection of requests from Philadelphia prosecutors to keep Abu-Jamal on death row back in April 2011. What was unexpected by Abu-Jamal supporters were the procedures surrounding the secretive court order, which appears to have violated a number of Pennsylvania Rules of Criminal Procedure.

Voters will be required to show an acceptable photo ID on Election Day. All photo IDs must contain an expiration date that is current, unless noted otherwise. Acceptable IDs include:
Also: From Progressive Democrats of America - Everything You’ve Ever Wanted to Know About Voter ID Laws. Department of Justice weighs in with information request. Corbett Administration will grudgingly comply. Penn Action is engaging in phone banks o get the word out to PA residents and Act Blue is taking up a collection to combat voter suppression here.

Reuters has the scoop on an event that took place earlier this week where nearly a hundred education profiteers -- ranging from executives at testing companies to private equity moguls eager to invest in education technology -- met at a swanky Manhattan club to cheer on the privatization of the U.S. education system:

What is going on with PAs voter ID law? What is the real purpose of the law? Is voter fraud really a legitimate concern? Newsworks has a piece clarifying the voter ID law and another piece looking at the Schmidt Report. Oh, and Pennsylvania Secretary of the Commonwealth Carol Aichele isn't really sure about the details of the voter ID law, but she's sure "that 99 percent of voters already have a valid form of ID, as the state has claimed." That's a statistic that the Brennan Center disagrees with. Update: ACLU-PAs final arguments. Excellent historical commentary on literacy tests and poll taxes.

Friday morning, July 18th — I was ready to head back to my home in Pittsburgh when we heard a rumor from a neighbor in Rock Creek that the monument to the 29 miners, who were killed in the Upper Big Branch Mine, was going to be off loaded. But that I had to get there soon cause the heavy equipment was going block the roads going both ways. I arrived just in time to get one of the last parking spaces and ended waiting with the media seven hours for the first 5 ton granite panel to be unloaded. There was almost no shade but the monument organizers had a tent and provided us with sandwiches and cold drinks. Also they provided us with cool place to be with A/C if we felt dangerously hot. Finally after several attempts the first panel was successfully unloaded and stood up. So I took a picture and here it is. I feel I was a part of history.

The just released Freeh Report on the Jerry Sandusky cover-up at Penn State is pretty incredible. ... Like nothing we’ve seen lately, it lifts a huge and heavy flat rock to reveal dark, wriggling life underneath.