Due to an unusually large number of events on my social calendar today (and, really, anything above zero is an unusually large number of events on my social calendar), I’ll be posting This Week in Military Justice tomorrow.

Happy Independence Day, everyone!

The vast majority of the comments on CAAFlog are valuable and appreciated.  But I continue to believe that comments that trash others from behind a veil of anonymity are inappropriate.  I’m reminded of what Justice Scalia wrote in his separate opinion in this week’s Doe v. Reed decision:

Requiring people to stand up in public for their political acts fosters civic courage, without which democracy is doomed.  For my part, I do not look forward to a society which, thanks to the Supreme Court, campaigns anonymously and even exercises the direct democracy of initiative and referendum hidden from public scrutiny and protected from the accountability of criticism.  This does not resemble the Home of the Brave.

I assume that most of the people who leave comments on this blog are military officers, attorneys, or both.  I hope you’ll agree that as a matter of professionalism, neither military officers nor attorneys should anonymously trash others.

If you are going to criticize others in the comment section of this blog, please post under your actual name.  If you want to post anonymously, please don’t criticize anyone.

Groundhog Day is Code 45’s unofficial holiday. 

This year we didn’t really need Punxsutawney Phil to figure out that winter will last another six weeks.  Nevertheless, happy Groundhog Day to Code 45 personnel and alumni!

CAAFlog now allows you to subscribe to comments on a particular post. Subscribing means you’ll receive an email every time a new comment is made to a post you’re subscribed to.

Just enter a valid email address and check the box when adding a comment:

You’ll receive a confirmation email to confirm that you really want to subscribe (only for the first-ever subscription):

Once you’re subscribed, you’ll have access to the subscription manager which allows you to modify your subscriptions, change your subscriber email address, or opt-out of all future subscriptions.

Every email you receive from the subscription software  (except the initial opt-in message) should include a link to the subscription manager. The blog software should also remember you after you post a comment (by using cookies) and replace the subscribe checkbox with a link to the subscription manager in posts to which you’re already subscribed.

Please let me know if you have any problems with this new feature.

I’ll be hitting the sky soon.  The No Man will complete our top-10 military justice stories of 2009 countdown while I’m away.  And I hope that all of my CAAFlog colleagues will post 2010’s military justice developments while I’m gone.  I’ll be back in the CAAFlog saddle on Friday night and I may claw my way onto the Internet once or twice before then.  Happy new year!

I ran out of time this weekend to write about CGCCA’s Holland opinion.  I’ll try to post a synopsis tomorrow night.

I’m going to be on the road the next couple days and probably won’t post again until Friday.  I hope that my CAAFlog colleagues will keep everyone up to date.  Perhaps one of them will post info about tomorrow’s scheduled House Judiciary Committee markup on H.R. 569.

I’m thrilled to announce that Stu Couch has accepted our offer to become a CAAFlog contributor.  Stu is a military justice expert whose 22-year Marine Corps career concluded with service as a Navy-Marine Corps Court of Criminal Appeals judge.  His extremely ethical work as a prosecutor in the military commission system was recognized by the American Bar Association, which honored him with its 2007 Minister of Justice Award.  His work as an NMCCA judge earned him the almost-as-prestigious designation of “The Great” status bestowed by the No Man.

In addition to his service as a judge advocate, Stu was also a Marine Corps pilot.  He’s now in civilian practice in Charlotte, North Carolina.

I look forward to reading his posts.

Here’s a link to the Commandant of the Marine Corps’ birthday message.

And here’s a link to Major General John Archer Lejeune’s classic 1921 birthday message.

Col Sullivan asks:

What does a blog administrator do when someone contributes a post that the adminstrator is ashamed to have on a blog with which his name is associated?

I think it’s awfully polite to refer our twice-convicted denizen Cossio as merely “someone,” but he continues:

Like Mill, I believe there is value in the expression and refutation of falsehoods.

Indeed. But Mill presumed the ability to make a refutation of an opinion. That’s something I can influence.

Starting today CAAFlog sports a comment rating system:

Enough negative ratings and a comment will be hidden:

It’s an adjustable trigger that I’ve set low and will adjust as necessary.

Enjoy.

UPDATE: An anonymous comment finds irony in this, but the tragedy of the commons appears when society gives room for anarchy; and no, a benevolent dictatorship isn’t the answer. Generally, the heckler is going to have a better barometer anyway.

The ratings are a moving target – enough negatives and the text of a comment is hidden. However, the comment itself isn’t deleted. The time and author still appear in the list, with the text available with just a click. Besides, enough subsequent positive votes will reveal the hidden comment. That’s hardly a blacklist.

Implemented at the same time is the option to easily quote another comment: