Morning Reads: Why Is the FBI "Visiting" Keystone and Tar Sands Opponents?

Good morning! On this date in 1967, the 25th amendment to the US Constitution was ratified. Spurred by the Kennedy assassination four years earlier, the amendment specified succession procedures if the president or vice president is unable to discharge their duties.

Coming soon –> Legal observers say Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas yesterday signaled that the Court will soon make same sex marriage a nationwide constitutional right. At Election Law Blog, Rick Hasen reads between the lines of Thomas’ dissent from the court’s refusal to hear Alabama’s challenge to a federal ruling striking down that state’s marriage laws.

War powers –> While the White House insists that it already has the requisite authority to wage war against Islamic State forces in Syria, officials say that the administration will nonetheless submit a request to Congress for a formal resolution. Kristina Wong reports for The Hill that “the new resolution is expected to spark fierce debate among lawmakers over whether the administration’s strategy against ISIS is working, whether U.S. ground troops should be explicitly ruled out, and for how long the authority should last.”

“We’re trying to learn more about the movement” –> That’s why lawyers say the FBI is making unannounced visits to question activists opposed to the Keystone XL pipeline and tar sands mining. In Oregon, Washington State and Idaho, according to Katie Valentine at ThinkProgress, “The agents have reportedly been targeting activists who have protested ‘megaloads,’ a truckload of tar sands extraction equipment that can be longer than a football field and can take up two lanes of a highway. These protests have blocked highways and delayed the equipment’s shipment.”

Ideology and science –> Two new studies confirm that political partisans tend to deny science when it clashes with their worldviews, and the effect is more pronounced among conservatives than liberals. Tom Jacobs has the details at Pacific Standard.

You call that a plan? –> Roosevelt Institute fellow Richard Kirsch writes at The Hill that under the “new” GOP alternative to Obamacare, we would “pay more to get lousy insurance and many more working Americans would go without health coverage.” AND: MoJo’s Stephanie Mencimer speaks to the “unusual” — and angry — people suing to stop receiving subsidies under the Affordable Care Act. ALSO: At The Daily Beast, Mary Agnes Carey explains why, despite “huge government efforts” to enroll Latinos in Obamacare, the program isn’t popular with this key demographic.

Meet the also-rans –> At The Atlantic, Russell Berman ponders what it is that motivates “the longest longshots” of the 2016 Republican primary contest to run despite the overwhelming odds against them.

Big government –> The DC City Council cancelled a hearing on implementing the marijuana legalization plan that was overwhelmingly approved by the district’s voters last year. The city’s new attorney general attorney warned that by holding the hearing they might face prison time for defying a spending ban imposed by Congress last year. WaPo’s Aaron Davis has more on that story.

“Back to the Nineteenth Century” –> Robert Reich says that corporate America’s ability to sow hostility toward labor unions, combined with “the growth of on-demand jobs like Uber,” are returning the US to “an era when many workers were ‘happy’ to toil twelve-hour days in sweat shops for lack of any better alternative.” AND: Republican Illinois Governor Bruce Rauner, an opponent of public sector unions, yesterday announced an executive order “that would bar unions from requiring all state workers to pay the equivalent of dues.” At the NYT, Monica Davey and Mitch Smith have details.

Hey, big spender –> Rep. Aaron Schock (R-IL) tells tea party crowds that he’s a humble, hard-working legislator who flies coach, but Jake Sherman, John Bresnahan and Anna Palmer report for Politico that the 33-year-old lawmaker’s “lavish” spending has become an issue “since The Washington Post revealed last week that he had his Capitol Hill office redecorated to resemble ‘Downton Abbey.'”

“Similar in size to a buffalo” –> That’s how paleontologists describe what is believed to be the largest rodent ever to roam the Earth — the 2,200-pound Josephoartigasia monesi. Last week, researchers at the University of York released a study that suggests the giant rat-like creature used its massive front teeth in much the same way an elephant uses its tusks. (Via: Science Daily)

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