Understanding Government

Dave Rozek of the Chicago Sun-Times reports that there is a “major effort” by Illinois state attorney general Lisa Madigan to make more child pornography prosecutions. The use of U.S Justice Dept. money to help states apprehend and prosecute users of child pornography has rapidly increased in the internet era. By one estimation, 50 people faced federal prosecution on child pornography in 1995 and 2,500 were prosecuted in 2010.

The Illinois chapter of the ACLU wants the U.S. Justice Dept. Civil Rights Division to investigate whether the Illinois State Police force uses consent searches unfairly to target black and Latino drivers. The Chicago Tribune’s Monique Garcia reports that state data shows Hispanics and African Americans are “two to three times more likely to be searched for contraband even though white motorists were more likely to be found in possession of drugs, alcohol or weapons.” Interestingly, the law that produced accessible data on state searches was pushed by then-state Sen. Barack Obama.  Obama has continued to pay attention to civil rights issues, boosting funding and staff for the Civil Rights Division.

There’s more than political donations or legions of arm-twisting lobbyists in the Washington lobbying toolbox.  Sometimes, there’s a status symbol cupcake, as Edward Wyatt reported in the New York Times.  With AT&T facing what would appear to be a formidable task of convincing the Federal Communications Commission and the Justice Department to approve its proposed $39 billion merger with T-Mobile, one wonders if the company will be strategically delivering chocolate Easter eggs to the regulators this time around.  Wyatt likened the delivery of the sought-after cupcakes to offices within the FCC during holiday season to a military operation.  The breakdown of who got how many cupcakes was labeled “proprietary.” (more…)

Suzy Khimm of Mother Jones reports that the Illinois GOP is stoking fears of voter fraud in the November elections and wants Tea Party activists to work as poll watchers who guard against fraud. In Illinois, Khimm writes, “local election boards seems grateful that there’s greater interest in filling chronic poll worker shortages. But many Democrats and election experts have expressed concern about placing activists driven by anti-fraud hysteria in charge of managing and overseeing voting stations.”

But it should be more than Democrats and left magazines like Mother Jones that get involved on this issue.  Career federal Justice Dept. officials, and political appointees of both Obama and Bush, should be screaming on the mountaintops that voter fraud doesn’t exist. (more…)

The Justice Department will provide Illinois a $1.2 million grant to better participate in a national system of gun background checks, the Associated Press reports. Illinois is one of seven states that will get money to put mental health records into a national background-check database. The FBI can deny gun sales to customers with questionable mental health records.

The federal grant announcement comes two months after Chicago Mayor Richard Daley and the City Council overturned a 28 year-old handgun ban — a decision forced by the U.S. Supreme Court, which effectively declared the ban unconstitutional. (more…)