I don’t think most people understand what happened yesterday. Our country changed. In many ways, it changed more yesterday than it did on 9/11/06. On that day 5 years ago, many people lost their lives. But our country’s principle’s were unscathed. Yesterday, Congress passed a bill which sacrificed much of what this country stands for, effectually doing what our enemies … Read More
The Torture Bill’s Biggest Flaws
From the New York Times: Enemy Combatants: A dangerously broad definition of “illegal enemy combatant” in the bill could subject legal residents of the United States, as well as foreign citizens living in their own countries, to summary arrest and indefinite detention with no hope of appeal. The president could give the power to apply this label to anyone he … Read More
NIE, NIE, NIE
If you’re interested in this subject, you’ve probably already discovered the controversial NIE already. The "key judgments" section was declassified by Bush and is available here [PDF format]. Even though the released portion of the NIE is three pages long, let me provide a summary of the summary done by Midtopia: Good news1. We’ve seriously damaged the leadership of Al-Qaeda. … Read More
The Clinton-Wallace Smackdown, or “What Did Bush Do To Combat Terrorists Pre-9/11”?
I have little to say about the whole controversy, except this: Clinton was right. Hirsch explains: [W]hen Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace gently asked the former president “why didn’t you do more” to put Al Qaeda “out of business,” he sparked an unexpected blast. Clinton, who had granted Wallace an interview at his signature Global Initiative Forum in New … Read More
Bush Busted In A Huge Lie
Glenn Greenwald says "this report alone ought to dictate the outcome of the election." If you haven’t heard the news, a leaked internal government report — a government report from the Bush Administration — says "No". A classified intelligence report concludes that the Iraq war has worsened the terrorist threat to the United States, U.S. officials told CNN Sunday. Some … Read More
Marty Lederman: “U.S. to be First Nation to Authorize Violations of Geneva”
Professor Lederman looks at the new detainee bill and speaks his mind: [I]t only takes 30 seconds or so to see that the Senators have capitualted entirely, that the U.S. will hereafter violate the Geneva Conventions by engaging in Cold Cell, Long Time Standing, etc., and that there will be very little pretense about it. In addition to the elimination … Read More
Quote Of The Day
Eugene Robinson: "It is not possible for our elected representatives to hold any sort of honorable "debate" over torture. Bush says he is waging a "struggle for civilization," but civilized nations do not debate slavery or genocide, and they don’t debate torture, either. This spectacle insults and dishonors every American."
In Bush’s America
…it’s okay to kidnap a Canadian citizen (a software engineer), lie to Canada about his whereabouts (Canada is an ally, right?), and ship the poor guy off to Syria (our enemy, right?) for a year or so. In Syria, he’s tortured and beaten with a metal cable until he confesses that he received training in Afghanistan. As is often the … Read More
On John Yoo
Never in my life have I witnessed such incredible incompetence in a constitutional scholar. I am referring to John Yoo, Bush’s legal advisor on torture and detainee policy, and his gloriously boneheaded op-ed in the New York Times. Yoo makes this wildly absurd claim: [T]he founders intended that wrongheaded or obsolete legislation and judicial decisions would be checked by presidential … Read More
Arm-Twisting To Get Torture Approval Letter
Wow. The Bush Administration got a bunch of JAG lawyers to "not object" to the Bush proposal to allow torture. But as it turns out, the JAG lawyers were not all that eager to endorse Bush’s proposal, and only relented after extreme pressure from higher-ups. From WaPo: White House officials released a letter from senior Pentagon uniformed lawyers, who said … Read More
Colin Powell Gets It
“The world is beginning to doubt the moral basis of our fight against terrorism. To redefine Common Article 3 would add to those doubts. Furthermore, it would put our own troops at risk.” That’s what Bush’s former Secretary of State Colin Powell says, as he joins the ranks of Senators McCain and Warner to stop the Bush attempt to legalize … Read More
Are We Winning The War On Terror?
Well, I suppose that depends on how you measuse it. Let’s look at three possible ways. (1) Al Qaeda These were the guys that attacked us on 9/11. If we’re winning the war on terror, one would hope that there are fewer of them now than there were five years ago. A simple graph, based on recent research by the … Read More
From The WTF?!? Department
I’ve read the same paragraphs four times now, and I still can’t believe what I’m reading: WASHINGTON (AP) — Nonlethal weapons such as high-power microwave devices should be used on American citizens in crowd-control situations before they are used on the battlefield, the Air Force secretary said Tuesday. Domestic use would make it easier to avoid questions in the international … Read More
Bush Vows To Google Bin Laden
Satire at MSNBC: Sept. 12, 2006 – In a nationally televised speech today, President George W. Bush issued his most direct threat ever to Osama bin Laden, vowing to use the search engine Google to find the Al Qaeda terror leader. "Osama bin Laden, you can run, but you can’t hide," Bush said, with his trademark steely resolve. "Google will … Read More
On Bush’s Speech Last Night
This commentary in the New York Times nails it: Fending off the chaos that would almost certainly come with civil war would be a reason to stay the course, although it does not inspire the full-throated rhetoric about freedom that Mr. Bush offered last night. But the nation needs to hear a workable plan to stabilize a fractured, disintegrating country … Read More