Obama's Back in Town; Remembering Sam Brown; McDermott and the Supremes

Chris Kornelis

Barack Obama at Qwest Field Event Center.

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More About

• Jim McDermott
• John Boehner
• Barack Obama
• U.S. Politics
• Politics

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Barack Obama makes a campaign stop at the Showbox SoDo on Tuesday, Dec. 11. Tickets to the 7:30 p.m. event are $100. You can buy them via BarackObama.com.

For more coverage of the 2008 presidential campaign, see SW's reports on local appearances from:

— Al Gore
— John Edwards
— Barack Obama
— John McCain
— Hillary Clinton

— Mike Huckabee

Supreme Court Disagrees With McDermott

The Supreme Court says it won't hear Rep. Jim McDermott's appeal of the case brought by House Minority Leader John Boehner that involved the taping of a 1996 phone call and the subsequent leaking of its contents—a discussion of how to respond to ethics charges against then–House Speaker Newt Gingrich—to newspaper reporters. (A D.C. appeals court ruled 5-4 in Boehner’s favor in May.)

McDermott, in a statement released this morning, says he knew the odds were against him since the Supreme Court accepts so few cases.

    "Nonetheless, I thought that the constitutional principles presented—the First Amendment protection of truthful speech and the separation of powers doctrine—warranted the Court's attention. I pursued this case based on my belief in the people’s right to know, and I continue to believe it was my sworn responsibility to vigorously defend that right.”

McDermott must now pay $60,000 in damages and more than $800,000 in legal fees to Boehner.

Remembering Sam Brown

A postmortem on the 2002 murder of police informant and street gospel singer Sam Brown, a case first detailed by SW: Brown's killer was sentenced to 39 years last week, in addition to the five years he has served in King County Jail. The case was one of the county's longest in history, one police and prosecutors labored to win after street dealer Slim Lyons, 59, shot their informant in the back of the head on a hobo camp pathway.

— Rick Anderson