At first glance, Lanell Williams-Yulee's legal fight against the Florida Bar has an appealingly underdogish aura about it. In 2009, Williams-Yulee declared her candidacy for county court judge in Hillsborough County, launching her campaign with a mass-mail fundraising letter that asked for "an early contribution" to help her "raise the initial funds." Plenty of campaigns start with this kind of gentle panhandling, of course. But Williams-Yulee was running to be a judge, and the Florida Code of Judicial Conduct explicitly states that judicial candidates "shall not personally solicit campaign funds." Williams-Yulee was charged with professional misconduct and fined $1,860.30. The judgeship went to another candidate.

Williams-Yulee was running a modest campaign for an obscure seat. But with that single letter, she waded into a controversy that pits democracy and free speech against judicial ethics and due process. That controversy will soon come to a head at the Supreme Court, as the justices recently agreed to review Williams-Yulee's case. And when the court hears the case later this term, it seems overwhelmingly likely that the justices who brought you Citizens United will take their First Amendment bushwhacker to judicial elections.

To see why Williams-Yulee's letter tripped this particular wire, you have to understand that judicial elections are one of the more idiosyncratic and hotly debated features of American democracy. In virtually every other country, judges are appointed, not elected, to prevent angry voters from punishing them for unpopular rulings. Even in the United States, the framers of the Constitution took care to insulate federal judges from the majoritarian will, granting them lifetime appointments and shuddering at the possibility that they might "consult popularity" and "the people" instead of "the Constitution and the laws." When it comes to picking judges, more democracy does not necessarily mean more justice.

But throughout most of the United States, judges have no choice but to consult "the people" from time to time - it's the people, after all, who gave them their jobs. Thirty-nine states put their judges up for election, forcing them to campaign on the contradictory promise that they will both respect the wishes of the people and maintain judicial independence. All that campaigning, of course, requires cash, often a great deal of it. Today, 30 states (including Florida) forbid judges from personally soliciting campaign funds, requiring them instead to set up committees to keep candidates a step removed from money matters. The premise behind these laws is that when judges beg for money, they diminish the impartiality of the judiciary.

Moscow will reduce gas supplies if Kiev starts siphoning deliveries destined for Europe, said Russia's President Vladimir Putin during a visit to Serbia.

"There are large transit risks. If we see that our Ukrainian partners start illegally taking our gas from the export pipeline as it was in 2008, we will equally reduce the amount of supply as happened in 2008," warned Putin on Thursday at a news conference in Belgrade, stressing he was "hopeful" it would not come to that.

However, the Russian president pledged that Moscow will supply enough gas to Europe this winter.

"I can tell you for sure, and I am saying with absolute responsibility, there will be no crisis in Europe due to the fault of Russian participants in energy cooperation," Putin stressed.

"Russia has always been a reliable supplier, we have enough resources."

Given the threat of gas disruption, the South Stream project starts looking increasingly attractive and "beneficial for European consumers," Putin said. The issues connected with the delay of the construction of South Stream are "of a political character" only, he added.

"In this case politics hurt the economy for sure, causing damage to a certain extent, even reducing the competitive advantages of the European economy in comparison with other regions of the world."

Putin requested support from his European partners, saying Russia couldn't "unilaterally construct a pipeline system worth billions of dollars if our partners are still thinking whether to develop the project or not."

The world is no longer shutting its eyes to the Benjamin Netanyahu government's obstructionism and violence

In the end, the result was emphatic. After three and a half hours of debate, MPs voted to recognise the state of Palestine by 274 votes to 12.

To be sure, the vote was non-binding and has no effect - for now - on government policy, as Israel's dwindling number of hardcore supporters will point out. And Israeli officials will affect unconcern, claiming that the emoting of MPs in a second-rate ex-imperialist power with delusions of grandeur means nothing.

Don't believe a word of it. As reports of last-minute lobbying from Jerusalem make clear, Israel knows it cannot afford to ignore this result - for two reasons. First, it provides a stark barometer reading of opinion in much of the Western world, where Israel craves respect and acceptance. Second, as a damning verdict on Israel's recent policies from an influential global power, the vote will contribute to its deepening international isolation and prompt other countries to press against the occupation.

If you need proof of just how friendless Israel's hard-Right government has become, consider the statements last night from MPs who would normally count themselves the country's natural allies. Arch-Tories such as Nicholas Soames (whose grandfather Winston Churchill is Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu's political hero) spoke eloquently in favour of Palestinian statehood. And Richard Ottoway, chair of the foreign affairs select committee, said that despite having been "a friend of Israel long before I became a Tory", its recent policies had "outraged me more than anything else in my political life", concluding: "If Israel is losing the support of people like me, it is losing a lot of people."

Brother-in-law of Mohammed Merah, 2 others, allowed to return to France from Syria via Turkey after failed attempt to join Islamic State

Paris - Confusion reigned Tuesday over the whereabouts of three suspected French jihadists arrested in Turkey who include the brother-in-law of Toulouse Jewish school killer Mohammed Merah after an apparent bungle by authorities.

The French interior ministry had announced that the three men, including the 29-year-old husband of Merah's sister Souad, Abdelhoued Bagadhali, had been arrested by French police on their arrival at Paris's Orly airport after being sent back from Turkey.

But it later turned out that the men had not landed in Paris at all, but were put on a flight to the southern city Marseille where they were - to their apparent surprise - able to walk freely from the airport.

The ministry claimed that after the pilot of the Paris-bound flight refused to allow them on board, the Turkish authorities put them on the flight to Marseille. But it insisted that Paris did not become aware of the change until after the men had landed on French soil.

Former Vice President Dick Cheney warned that the next terrorist attack on the US will be far worse than 9/11 during a nearly two-hour interview. He also took pride in the use of waterboarding and in giving the National Security Agency free reign.

The 73-year-old sat down with neoconservative political pundit Bill Kristol on Sunday for the Weekly Standard editor's latest installment of Conversations with Bill Kristol. The two discussed Cheney's time as secretary of defense; the Gulf War; the Nixon, Ford and Reagan administrations; 9/11; and the threats we face today.

"You've got to be a fool to believe isolation as a strategy is the way to go. We have no choice but to be involved in that part of the world, and if we're not actively involved, there are some very bad things that are going to happen," Cheney warned.

He believes that if the Iranians get nuclear weapons, it won't be long before others in the region also have nuclear weapons, hinting that the deadly weapons could fall into the heads of the Islamic State or Syria.

Dozens of French teenagers, including a young Jewish girl, have fled the country to join Islamic State militants fighting in Syria and Iraq, French intelligence has revealed.

At least 100 girls and young women from France have left to join terrorists in Syria in recent weeks, up from just a handful 18 months ago when the trip was not even on Europe's security radar.

The departures are less the whims of adolescents and more the conclusions of months of work by organised radical recruitment networks that specifically target young people in search of an identity.

These mostly online networks recruit girls to serve as wives, babysitters and housekeepers for jihadists, with the aim of planting multi-generational roots for a long-lasting Islamic caliphate.

US corporate-financier funded policy think tanks have been taking turns in recent weeks floating the narrative that the next logical step to stopping so-called "Islamic State" (ISIS) terrorists in Syria is removing the Syrian government from power - this despite the fact that the only cohesive, organized force in the region capable of fighting ISIS terrorists is the Syrian government and its Syrian Arab Army.

Kenneth M. Pollack a policy writer at the Brookings Institution and a signatory of the noxious 2009 "Which Path to Persia?" report Brookings produced which advocated arming and funding listed terrorist organizations to fight Iran under the cover of street protests (exactly how the US went about plunging Syria into its current crisis), has recently penned his thoughts on what should be done in Syria. Titled, "An Army to Defeat Assad: How to Turn Syria's Opposition Into a Real Fighting Force," Pollack claims:

...there is, in fact, a way that the United States could get what it wants in Syria - and, ultimately, in Iraq as well - without sending in U.S. forces: by building a new Syrian opposition army capable of defeating both President Bashar al-Assad and the more militant Islamists.

A 'handful' of Jewish teenagers said to have joined ISIS. Jewish community officials say trend 'inconceivable.'

More than one Jewish convert to Islam has joined the Islamic State (ISIS) terror group in Syria, a French official revealed Monday - days after a French Jewish teenager was reported to be working for the Islamist extremist organization.

More than 1,000 French citizens have joined ISIS, the official told Channel 2, based on recent figures from the French Interior Ministry.

While the official stressed that people "of Jewish extraction" are a "handful" of projected foreign nationals in Syria, the statement surfaces amid heightened fears about ISIS and the Jewish world.

Meyer Habib, a member of French parliament, told Channel 2 that the jihadists have become a hot topic in the Jewish community, but that no one could confirm whether or not their loved ones had joined the group.

In the midst of the war against ISIS (Islamic State) now taking place in both Iraq and Syria, a possible shifting of alliances that could fundamentally alter the balance of power in the region is taking place, and no one seems to have noticed. Specifically, the burgeoning relationship between the Islamic Republic of Iran and the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region of Northern Iraq has the potential to remake the political landscape of the Middle East. Naturally, such a development is part of a broader geopolitical gambit by Iran, and it will have significant ramifications for all regional actors. However, it is Turkey, the gulf monarchies, and Israel that potentially have the most to lose from such a development.

While Iran has long-standing disputes with elements of its own Kurdish minority, it has demonstrably taken the lead in aiding Iraqi Kurds in their war against extremist fighters loyal to ISIS. As Kurdish President Massud Barzani explained in late August, "The Islamic Republic of Iran was the first state to help us...and it provided us with weapons and equipment." This fact alone, coupled with the plausible, though unconfirmed, allegations of Iranian military involvement on the ground in Kurdish Iraq, demonstrates clearly the high priority Tehran has placed on cooperation with Barzani's government and the Kurdish people in the fight against the Saudi and Qatari-backed militants of ISIS. The question is, why? What is it that Iran hopes to gain from its involvement in this fight? Who stands to lose? And how could this change the region?

A senior Iranian official says reconstruction of the impoverished Gaza Strip and enhancement of the Palestinian territory's defense capabilities are on Tehran's agenda.

During a meeting with Secretary-General of the Islamic Jihad Movement of Palestine Ramadan Abdullah Mohammad Shalah in Tehran on Wednesday evening, Secretary of Iran's Supreme National Security Council Ali Shamkhani reiterated Tehran's unswerving support for the Palestinian nation and anti-Israel resistance front, and pledged the continued dispatch of medical and food convoys to Gaza.

"Rebuilding Gaza and improving its defense capabilities in the face of attacks by the child-killing regime (of Israel) are on Iran's agenda," the senior Iranian official stated.

Shamkhani also criticized donor countries' failure to provide funds pledged for the rebuilding of the Gaza Strip in the aftermath of Israeli strikes on the blockaded sliver, slamming international organizations for failing to stop the destruction of Gaza and the massacre of defenseless civilians.