President Barack Obama May 19 announced plans for national fuel efficiency requirements. The policy is aimed at increasing fuel economy and reducing greenhouse gas emissions and is projected to conserve 1.8 billion barrels of oil and reduce emissions by an approximate 900 million metric tons under the life of the program.

The beginning of President Obama's extention of long-overdue public control over Detroit. Let's hope it isn't also the end. From Motor Trend, May 12:

Chrysler cleared a major hurdle in its bankruptcy restructuring last week when holdout investors gave up their quest for better compensation, but there are plenty of hurdles left. Chrysler dealers, fearful of losing their franchises, are banding together to fight back against the company's consolidation while the Automotive Task Force has slashed the company's ad budget.

Key Democrats on the House Energy and Commerce Committee endorsed a climate bill and Republicans readied more than 400 amendments to the measure May 19. Democrats are supporting a measure that would instate a carbon-trading system, which in theory would spur development of less-polluting energy sources such as wind and solar by regulating emissions caused by energy sources such as oil and coal.

As celebrations break out in Colombo over the Sri Lankan armed forces' taking of the last small strip of coastline controlled by the Tamil Tiger rebels, there are ominous signs that the coming "peace" will be a grim one at the very best. AP reports May 18 that three Sri Lankan doctors who treated hundreds of badly wounded civilians in understaffed, makeshift hospitals in the besieged zone were detained on accusations they gave false information about the casualties to the media.

Bahar Idriss Abu Garda, leader of Darfur's United Resistance Front, appeared before the International Criminal Court at The Hague May 18 to face war crimes charges over an attack that killed 12 African Union (AU) peacekeepers in September 2007. He is the first suspect to appear before the ICC regarding the Darfur conflict. Abu Garda, 46, turned himself in voluntarily a day earlier to face the charges.

A coalition of progressive organizations May 18 filed disciplinary complaints with five state bar associations seeking the disbarment of 12 former US government officials associated with the legal rationales behind the Bush administration's use of so-called enhanced interrogation techniques. Complaints filed by the group Velvet Revolution with the bar associations of New York, Pennsylvania, California, Texas, and the District of Columbia allege that former attorneys general John Ashcroft, Alberto Gonzales and Michael Mukasey, former Office of Legal Council lawyers John Yoo and Jay Bybee, former vice presidential chief of staff David Addington, former Pentagon official Douglas Feith, and other government officials violated the Rules of Professional Conduct by advocating the use of torture and should be disbarred as a result.

The US Supreme Court on May 18 ruled 5-4 in Ashcroft v. Iqbal that a complaint filed against former Attorney General John Ashcroft, FBI director Robert Mueller and other officials failed to demonstrate an intentional pattern of discrimination. Pakistani national Javaid Iqbal, detained on an immigration violation in the wake of the 9-11 attacks, alleged mistreatment by the FBI based on religious and ethnic bias during his detention in a Brooklyn maximum security federal prison, and that Ashcroft and Meuller became complicit in the discrimination when they approved the policy that resulted in his detention.

From The Independent, May 16, links added:

A single American Special Forces group was behind at least three of Afghanistan's worst civilian casualty incidents, The Independent has learnt, raising fundamental questions about their ongoing role in the conflict.