Guantanamo detention constitutes torture, abuse and ill-treatment. Long-term detention compounds it. Force-feeding increases unconscionable pain and suffering. Doing so violates core rule of law principles.

Permanent war is longstanding policy. America deplores peace. Throughout its history, it's waged war annually at home and/or abroad. Today it does so globally.

By Sue Sturgis - Monday, May 13, 2013

Amount the sequester will cut from the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children, also known as WIC: $333 million.

Presidential Medals of Freedom are awarded annually. They mock what they claim to represent. Many go to deplorable recipients.

By Brandon Smith - Znet

Historically, the expanded use of the terrorist label by governments tends to coincide with the rising tides of despotism...Those citizens who present the greatest philosophical or physical threat to the centralization of power are usually the first to suffer. I do not think it is unfair to say that any system of authority that suddenly claims to see terrorists under every rock and behind every tree is probably about to rain full-on fascism down upon the population.

More than targeting political enemies is involved. The practice is longstanding. Republican and Democrat administrations use the IRS abusively.

The American Economic Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (ARRA) increased the SNAP benefit by 13.6 percent beginning April 2009. It was always something of a shock absorber, a measure to make sure the disaffected poor would be able to have something in their belly. But as human vulnerability is treated as weakness by the budget hawks of the GOP, the scheme was always going to come under criticism and eventual savaging.

By LINN WASHINGTON Jr. - Counterpunch Weekend Edition

Federal authorities publicly plot encouraging bounty hunters to kidnap a fugitive black radical from a foreign country for return to prison in the U.S. to achieve long-delayed justice...This sounds like the FBI action on May 2, 2013 in placing former Black Panther and Black Liberation Army member Assata Shakur on its “Most Wanted Terrorists” list – the first female to have that dubious distinction.

Constitutional law requires reasonable suspicion that a crime has been, is being, or will be committed to justify stopping and frisking a suspect.

By David Walsh - WSWS

The visit to America in mid-May by Prince Harry of Wales, third in line of succession to the British throne, coinciding with the release of a new film adaptation of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby (1925), brings into focus a number of issues.

By Natasha Lennard - May 13, 2013

Following the death of father of four, David Sal Silva last week, his family’s attorneys are calling for police to release bystander video evidence that reportedly shows California Highway Patrol officers brutally beating the 33-year-old. A video from a surveillance camera...has been released and shows the man repeatedly struck with a baton.

Manufactured national security threats, silencing dissent, targeting whistle-blowers, and challenging press freedom subvert constitutional rights.

By Alice Walker - May 15, 2013

Today, only a few years older than Assata Shakur, and marveling at the unenviable state of humanity’s character worldwide, I find I can only pray for all of us...[T]hat the US government can now offer two million dollars for the capture of a very small, not young, black woman who was brutally abused, even shot, over three decades ago, as if we don’t need that money to buy people food, clothes, medicine, and decent places to live.

Obama continues lawless Bush practices. Torture remains official policy. Innocence is no defense. Crimes of war, against humanity and genocide continue.

By Tom Carter - WSWS

The drive towards the establishment of an American police state, initiated under the Bush administration, has shifted into high gear under Obama. For nearly twelve years, the phony “war on terror” has been used as the overarching pretext for illegal imperialist war abroad and a methodical assault on democratic rights at home. The basic structure of authoritarian rule is now emerging into plain view.