Our system of justice, despite all its flaws, does have certain institutional pressures that provide it a relentlessness once some wrongdoing comes to light.
Political pressure can delay, obscure and deflect criminal prosecutions but it can rarely stop it altogether. More than six decades later the occasional Nazi still goes to trial. After 30, 40 or even 50 years Civil Rights cases have resulted in convictions. War crimes, especially, are unbounded in time except for death. That is why culpable individuals such as John Yoo, David Addington, Dick Cheney and even George Bush should be very worried about the legal process that is starting to unfold.
Scot Horton, as always, sums things up very well here with seven points about the recently released report on torture. The most chilling may his first point: the worst is yet to come.
Tuesday, August 25, 2009
Monday, August 24, 2009
Threatening to kill children
According to the IG report, this is one of the tactics we used.
It will obviously take a determined and excruciating effort to root out the rot that the Bush-era torture policies fostered. And there will be many, many voices trying to fight it. Most will claim any investigation will be merely political, although this is really laughable as many of these same people supported very political investigations during the Bush years.
In any case, there are some very important principles at stake here, and winning this battle is far from certain. But losing the battle for accountability risks very deep, profound and long-lasting (generational) damage to America. If only a few privates, sergeants, contractors and field agents are punished for this betrayal of American values then those values will have been proven hollow and meaningless for all the world to see.
It will obviously take a determined and excruciating effort to root out the rot that the Bush-era torture policies fostered. And there will be many, many voices trying to fight it. Most will claim any investigation will be merely political, although this is really laughable as many of these same people supported very political investigations during the Bush years.
In any case, there are some very important principles at stake here, and winning this battle is far from certain. But losing the battle for accountability risks very deep, profound and long-lasting (generational) damage to America. If only a few privates, sergeants, contractors and field agents are punished for this betrayal of American values then those values will have been proven hollow and meaningless for all the world to see.
Monday, August 17, 2009
Your papers, please
Seems a 68-year-old man can't walk down the street without ID these days, even when he's white (and famous!).
Saturday, July 25, 2009
Fourth Amendment? What Fourth Amendment?
As Jack Balkin at Balkinization points out, the Cheney plan to use the military to arrest terrorists in the United States amounted to a suspension of the Fourth Amendment.
The central problem with the Cheney/Yoo/Addington theory was that it allowed the President to declare anyone in the United States an enemy combatant. Then, once the President made this declaration, the person would lose all their civil rights. The military could arrest and imprison the person without charges or any of the procedural protections of the Bill of Rights; it could torture them for information (under the theory that these techniques did not shock the conscience under the Eighth Amendment), and it could hold them indefinitely in a military prison. The problem with the Cheney/Yoo/Addington theory, in short, was that it embraced elements of military dictatorship within the United States.
Frankly, until Republicans come to terms with this, I really can't see trusting them with executive ranch power again. Ever.
The central problem with the Cheney/Yoo/Addington theory was that it allowed the President to declare anyone in the United States an enemy combatant. Then, once the President made this declaration, the person would lose all their civil rights. The military could arrest and imprison the person without charges or any of the procedural protections of the Bill of Rights; it could torture them for information (under the theory that these techniques did not shock the conscience under the Eighth Amendment), and it could hold them indefinitely in a military prison. The problem with the Cheney/Yoo/Addington theory, in short, was that it embraced elements of military dictatorship within the United States.
Frankly, until Republicans come to terms with this, I really can't see trusting them with executive ranch power again. Ever.
Video proves police corruption
The more these kinds of things happen the mroe I think video should be a regular part of all police operations. It will protect the good gops and deter the bad ones.
http://news.aol.com/article/video-clears-suspects/526114
http://news.aol.com/article/video-clears-suspects/526114
Cheney wanted to send the Army into Buffalo!!!
Can you imagine!!
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/25/us/25detain.html?_r=2&hp
It would have been quite the wake-up call, I suppose. And suppose they had screwed up? Imagine if there was collateral damage in Buffalo?
And I wonder if the military brass would have been willing to go along? I suspect that there would have been a real pushback on this one, had it gone that far.
My God, Cheney was out of control.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/07/25/us/25detain.html?_r=2&hp
It would have been quite the wake-up call, I suppose. And suppose they had screwed up? Imagine if there was collateral damage in Buffalo?
And I wonder if the military brass would have been willing to go along? I suspect that there would have been a real pushback on this one, had it gone that far.
My God, Cheney was out of control.
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Pressure on Peters
Lt. Col. Ralph Peters, a contributing editor at Armed Forces Journal and regular talking head on cable TV for his military "expertise," sometimes has worthwhile things to say, although often I find myself disagreeing with him.
But his recent appearances on cable shows where he appears to encourage the Taliban to actually execute a captured American soldier (that Peters apparently suspects is a 'deserter' for God knows what reason) is one of the most appalling things to occur among the punditry in quite some time. It hasn't gotten a lot of attention from mainstream media, but the online media is abuzz. One can only imagine what it would have been like if someone from the "Left" said something like that.
In any case, a Congressman has now weighed in, which may very well become a tipping point.
Links here: http://www.balloon-juice.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/massa.pdf
I honestly can't fathom what Peters is thinking here, but I don't see any justification at all for it, even of the solider was a deserter.
But his recent appearances on cable shows where he appears to encourage the Taliban to actually execute a captured American soldier (that Peters apparently suspects is a 'deserter' for God knows what reason) is one of the most appalling things to occur among the punditry in quite some time. It hasn't gotten a lot of attention from mainstream media, but the online media is abuzz. One can only imagine what it would have been like if someone from the "Left" said something like that.
In any case, a Congressman has now weighed in, which may very well become a tipping point.
Links here: http://www.balloon-juice.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/07/massa.pdf
I honestly can't fathom what Peters is thinking here, but I don't see any justification at all for it, even of the solider was a deserter.
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