In the letter released Monday, the 13 law professors and former government officials went further, writing that "the Justice Department's defense of what it concedes was secret and warrantless electronic surveillance of persons within the United States fails to identify any plausible legal authority for such surveillance.
Presumably, some parts are enacted under the Commerce Clause, but it is plausible that the authority comes under the Bankruptcy Clause, whether Congress knew it or not.
The broad employment of brutal techniques, coupled with the high profile and the urgency of the hunt for Guzmán, makes it seem all the more plausible that Mexican authorities used unsavory, and illegal, means to pursue him.
But from medieval times to the 18th century and even into the 19th, a probable belief was most often merely one that seemed plausible, came on good authority, or was worthy of approval.
But in recent days, the Israeli officials have been campaigning to dismiss Mr. Arafat and the Palestinian Authority as plausible negotiating partners, based on documents Israel has seized in raids on the West Bank, and interrogations of some 1,800 Palestinians arrested during the offensive, including senior aides to Mr. Arafat.
But "Jesus, Jobs, and Justice" suggests a plausible counterreading: abuse of authority and unexamined prejudice are typical of the religious complexion generally — they are the dark side of faith, the price to be paid for the fortitude and selflessness that religious conviction often inspires.
Given those reforms, it should be unacceptable for a branch of the U.S. government to hire armed thugs in Afghanistan to kill, threaten, torture, and abuse Afghan and Pakistani citizens under the barely plausible deniability of U.S. authority.
Ahmadinejad could have been awarded the election after a decent interval giving the authorities a plausible amount of time to count the votes, or even after a run off against his main challenger, Mir Hossein Mousavi.
With legislation in Congress that could gut all or some of their regulatory authority, it's plausible that agencies are now trying to out-regulate one another.
This decision raises no plausible question about EPA's authority to do so.
It was also less likely to attract the ire of competition authorities, contained a plausible commitment to maintaining employment and offered a better balance between cash and an equity stake in the new company.
