Many penalties under the Clean Air Act base their amounts on a per-barrel rate. As much as $4,300 a barrel could be owed to the government by BP, especially if they were found liable of gross negligence in the disaster, so this increase could mean up to $1.29 billion to BP’s bottom line.

The most striking aspect of the government’s motion to dismiss the ACLU/CCR lawsuit challenging the use of targeted killing is that the government does not commit to the basis for its authority to kill an American citizen like Anwar al-Awlaki with no review.

Live from Denver’s medical marijuana Plant Medicine Expo is a marijuana debate moderated by Law and Order SVU’s Richard Belzer. Belzer, a cancer survivor, will host a discussion about medical and Colorado’s new regulations.

Jasmine Farrier’s Congressional Ambivalence tackles a subject that is both classic and timely: delegation of policy choices to the President and the executive branch. Farrier analyzes delegation to the executive on military base closures, trade policy (“fast track”), and the “War on Terror”—the PATRIOT ACT, Iraq policy, Guantanamo, and surveillance wiretaps. She finds a recurring theme of ambivalence: expressions of reluctance before Congress cedes power, expressions of regret after the fact. But Farrier suggests that Congress nonetheless rarely reclaims power once it has been ceded to the executive, a point illustrated perfectly by the PATRIOT act.

When Ally Financial, formerly GMAC Mortgage, appeared to suspend foreclosure evictions in 23 states, they left out the ones where a judge is not required to sign off on foreclosures, including California, one of the four “sand states” with a massive amount of delinquencies and defaults. However, Attorney General Jerry Brown, who is running for Governor, has found a reason to demand a delay to any Ally/GMAC foreclosures:

Rep. Judy Chu, the last member of Congress to question Stephen Colbert during a hearing on migrant farm workers and an AgJobs bill, took issue with the media hand-wringing over the comedian’s in-character testimony, saying instead that he brought an important message to Congress and did a far better job covering the issue than any so-called straight reporter.

The late, but great, news Friday afternoon is the decision of Western District of Washington (WDWA) Judge Ronald Leighton in the case of Air Force Major Margaret Witt finding DADT unconstitutional and reinstating Witt to her military position.

Just Say Now will be livestreaming a debate on medical marijuana today at 6:30 pm ET in Denver, Colorado. Law and Order star, stand up comic and cancer survivor Richard Belzer will moderate the debate.

In early 2009, the Administration proposed to put the banks through “stress tests” to see how they’d survive more adverse scenarios. So why didn’t the economic team also have a test in case their own recovery plans proved to be insufficient?

Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) is pushing a bill that aims to put yet more people in jail for using marijuana, even hoping to create a crime for “conspiracy to possess” marijuana that could put people in jail for planning to fly to Amsterdam with their friends to smoke pot.

That’s bad enough, and luckily Nancy Pelosi pulled the bill of the House’s fast track. But Lamar Smith continues his war on marijuana, hilariously suggesting on Fox News that Barack Obama is “encouraging the use of marijuana.”

But Paul Armentano, Deputy Director of NORML, took to the pages of The Hill newspaper to give a reality check to Lamar Smith’s lies.