In his State of the Union address, President Obama announced a new special unit to investigate abusive lending and packaging of mortgage risk that led to the housing and financial crisis. These abuses began years ago, under the Bush administration and possibly before. Yet since it's widely felt that impunity...

I am attending the 50th Anniversary of the Southwest Georgia Civil Rights Movement here in Albany, Georgia. As a first year law student, in the summer of 1963, not quite half a century ago, I worked during the summer as a law clerk for C. B. King, a noted black...

As we commemorate this day, we can take note of much progress, although we need to reflect on how much more there still is to do. In the US, we have had two women serve as Secretary of State (including one who was the first woman to be taken...

In his recently published book, former President George W. Bush admits that when asked to approve waterboarding, long considered torture under US and international precedents, his response was, "Damn right." This admission has created a difficult dilemma for President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder.

Torture is...

Shirley Sherrod's journey to self-awareness and an understanding of the hardships faced by both poor blacks and poor whites started in Baker County, a beautiful but dangerous place in rural southwest Georgia. In 1965, her father was murdered by a white man, who was never even indicted. Rather than...

Former Vice President Dick Cheney has triggered a roaring debate by his recent and repeated claim that torture "worked." Last week, Senator Lindsay Graham echoed the claim that torture "works" and added that is has for five hundred years (a timescale which connects us to the Spanish Inquisition).

Recent...

Despite President Bush's frequent claim that "we don't do torture," top officials of the US government this month admitted that waterboarding was used on at least three detainees. The White House reaction was to announce that, if needed, waterboarding would be used again.

Since crimes in high places have...

For the first time since the Bush administration took office, three members of the House Judiciary Committee, Robert Wexler (D-FL), Luis Gutierrez (D-IL), and Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), are calling for hearings on the impeachment of Vice President Richard Cheney.

Their position, while courageous, is not surprising. What is surprising...

For the first time since the Bush administration took office, three members of the House Judiciary Committee, Robert Wexler (D-FL), Luis Gutierrez (D-IL), and Tammy Baldwin (D-WI), are calling for hearings on the impeachment of Vice President Richard Cheney.

Their position, while courageous, is not surprising. What is surprising...

Though it failed to send his nomination the way of Robert Bork, Attorney General nominee Michael Mukasey's evasiveness on the definition of torture has done something historic. It has made it unmistakably clear to mainstream observers that the President may be criminally liable for violating anti-torture laws. Criminal liability of...

At the request of State Senator Eric Oemig, I respectfully submit this testimony in support of Senate...

Recent events--the Foley scandal, the Woodward book, revelations about White House scorn for evangelical Christians, the Abramoff scandal, not to mention the increasingly dire situation in Iraq--have all converged in a kind of tsunami headed for the Republican majority in the House and Senate. Of course, it could change course.

This is my first blog on the Huffington Post and there is so much to talk about it's hard to know where to begin.

I want to start with a point I made in my new book, The Impeachment of George W. Bush, about why the framers of the...