White House rolls out relief program for millions of college debt holders

A conference call with reporters today revealed more details about the Obama administration’s plan to roll out a program for student debt relief.

Education Secretary Arne Duncan Duncan, Director of the White House Domestic Policy Council Melody Barnes and Raj Date, Special Advisor to the Secretary of the Treasury on the More…

Georgetown study says college degree still worth the front-end costs

Despite the soaring costs of college (rising at 3 percent above inflation for over a decade), a new report from the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workplace argues the lifetime financial benefits are still worth the five-digit amounts of debt graduates endure.

Clinton on Human Rights, Development and Democracy

For the past year, the neoconservative conception of democracy promotion and human rights — hollow elections; wars waged under the pretext of do-gooderism; speeches rather than actions — have been embraced uncritically by major media to measure President Obama and find him wanting. Today at Georgetown University, Secretary of More…

Former OLC Director Not Opposed to Criminal Investigation of OLC Lawyers

Former Acting Assistant Attorney General Daniel Levin, who headed the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel under President George W. Bush after the departure of Jack Goldsmith, said this morning that “I personally am not opposed to criminal investigation of my conduct and others during the period in question.” Levin More…

NPR Reports on Specific Proposal for Preventive Detention

NPR’s report this morning that the Brookings Institution’s Benjamin Wittes has proposed what’s expected to be a highly influential plan for “preventive detention” — which could lock up “dangerous” terror suspects potentially forever without charge or trial — gives even more urgency to the question that Spencer raised More…

Second Circuit to Re-Hear Extraordinary Rendition Case Today

The case of Maher Arar, the Canadian citizen arrested in New York and sent to Syria to be interrogated under torture, will be re-heard today by the Second Circuit Court of Appeals in New York, sitting en banc.

As I reported earlier, the 34-year-old computer consultant of Syrian descent More…

Did McCain Hit Back at George Will?

My TWI colleague, Ari Melber, raises an interesting point in response to a comment Sen. John McCain made in that interview with the editorial board of The Des Moines Register. Defending Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin against charges that she is not ready to assume the presidency, if More…