AP is reporting: “A first-of-its-kind law bars public high schools in Maryland from automatically sending student scores on a widely used military aptitude test to recruiters, a practice that critics say was giving the armed forces backdoor access to young people without their parents’ consent. School districts around the country have the choice of whether…

PETER BARNES Co-author of Climate Solutions: A Citizen’s Guide, Barnes said today: “For months essential climate legislation has been delayed while Senators John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.) cut deals with lobbyists. Now the results are out: a mind-boggling bonanza of giveaways for corporate polluters and every energy industry except renewables. “Fortunately, there is…

PAUL KAWIKA MARTIN Martin is political director of Peace Action, one of several groups urging President Obama — who is meeting Afghanistan President Hamid Karzai today in Washington — to say “yes to President Karzai’s request for the U.S. to support peace talks now to end the war.” ROBERT NAIMAN Naiman is policy director of…

ANUPAM CHANDER LUIS FUENTES-ROHWER ANGELA ONWUACHI-WILLIG All three are professors of law: Anupam Chander is at the University of California-Davis School of Law; Luis Fuentes-Rohwer is at Indiana University’s School of Law; and Angela Onwuachi-Willig is at the University of Iowa College of Law. They are among the writers of “The White House’s Kagan talking…

FRANCIS BOYLE The Wall Street Journal reports: “The White House said Friday that Elena Kagan’s membership on an advisory panel for the securities firm Goldman Sachs Group Inc. wouldn’t disqualify her for a position on the Supreme Court. … From 2005 to 2008, Ms. Kagan was a paid member of the Research Advisory Council of…

SHANE KADIDAL Kadidal is senior managing attorney of the Guantánamo Global Justice Initiative at the Center for Constitutional Rights in New York City. He just wrote the piece “Senator Lieberman’s Latest Constitutional Buffoonery,” which states: “Senator Lieberman [Thursday] proposed a bill that would strip American citizenship from anyone who has ‘provid[ed] material support or resources…

ANTONIA JUHASZ Juhasz recently wrote a piece for the UK Guardian titled “BP spends millions lobbying as it drills ever deeper and the environment pays.” Director of the Chevron program at Global Exchange, Juhasz is author of The Tyranny of Oil: The World’s Most Powerful Industry — and What We Must Do to Stop It.…

COSTAS PANAYOTAKIS Panayotakis is associate professor of sociology at the New York City College of Technology at CUNY. He said today: “Basically, you have a new government imposing the austerity policies that it ran against, attempting to solve the crisis on the backs of ordinary Greeks. And, as is usually the case with the International…

MAUREEN WEBB Author of the book Illusions of Security: Global surveillance and democracy in the post-9/11 world, Webb said today: “The pervasive surveillance systems that have been implemented since 9/11 have pernicious effects on the democratic freedoms of ordinary people and, as this [Times Square] case underlines, only limited utility in fighting real terrorists. Tragedy…

SHAHID MAHMOOD Mahmood was an editorial cartoonist for Dawn, a national newspaper in Pakistan. He is now internationally syndicated with the New York Times Syndicate. He said today: “People become radicalized through the corruptions of an Islamist agenda, the excesses of capitalism and a heavy-handed U.S. foreign policy.” ALI ABUNIMAH Abunimah is co-founder of the…