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Published Letters: 2957 Editor's Choice: 2
then he has the power to do the same thing to William Penn, based on the feeling that Quakers are an existential threat.
The central issue isn't whether al-Marri is a Quaker.
The central issue is that this country is founded on the principle that there shall not be a monarch with the power to do what was done to William Penn (and to many others).
Not a fair comparison, of course -- Penn was only held without trial for 8 and 1/2 months.
The appeals court decision doesn't go to the central issue. It doesn't address the due process problems of the PATRIOT act. It merely says that President Bush can't violate the PATRIOT act.
Under the PATRIOT act, the Administration can detain people without trial.
Just not forever. And THAT is the limitation that the reactionary radicals want to abolish.
As G.G. wrote, we should be shocked, yet we calmly accept the radicalism of those who say the President should have the power to go beyond the PATRIOT act, or any other law.
Even in the United Kingdom, nowadays, the notion that any person should have such unchecked power is radical and reactionary.
Yet here, in the former colonies, there are alleged "conservatives" who want to undo our own revolution, and, even further, want to undo the so-called Glorious Revolution of 1688. How far back do they want to take us?
He's been interrogated. Any knowledge he held is now very stale. Is he, still, being held to make him talk? Or is it, now, to keep him from talking?
http://nwanews.com/adg/Editorial/192900
Republicans have locked up the pundit vote
Gene LyonsPosted on Wednesday, June 13, 2007
Nobody knows who next year’s presidential candidates will be. This column has no particular favorite and will make no predictions.
Even so, it’s not necessary to be a prophet to know how Beltway pundits will handle the so-called character issue.
The Republican nominee will be a virile, decisive straight-shooter who’s 100 percent “authentic” and “comfortable in his own skin.”
The Democrat will be an indecisive phony, uncertain of his / her identity, but willing to strike any pose or pander to any constituency in a self-serving bid for power.
[ . . . ] In short, there’s no evidence that the “Sabbath Gasbags,” in Calvin Trillin’s immortal phrase, have any more insight into the candidates’ character than a trailerpark palm reader and somewhat less than my basset hound Fred, who could at least sniff their hands and figure out whose ears they’d been scratching.
[ . . . ] The brilliant blogger “Digby” asks a penetrating question: Why do so many male Washington courtiers have giggling mancrushes on Republican politicians?
Personally, I blame “heterosexual panic.” Half the insulting e-mails and all the anonymous phone calls this column generates deal in sexual insult. Whether it’s fear of terrorism, uneasiness at the prospect of a woman president or cultural change generally, the GOP base responds like trained seals to tough-guy poses. [ . . . ]
— – • – – Free-lance columnist Gene Lyons is a Little Rock author and recipient of the National Magazine Award.
Something tells me that Gene Lyons won't be invited to sit and chat on TV with Brit Hume or Chris Matthews.
geemoney:
Typo?
The ruling states specifically
"If a terrorist alien's removal 'is unlikely for the reasonably foreseeable future,' he 'may be detained for additional periods of up to six months'..."Am I being naive, or is this exactly the justification used for what is, ultimately and practically, indefinite detention? That is, if the "Patriot" Act is being used as the legal standard upon which this decision is based, it seems to me that one could argue that al Marri has really only undergone a few of these periods.- - geemoney - - Wednesday, June 13, 2007 11:56 PM
The "s" in "periods" isn't a typo.
It's true that there can be multiple, consecutive, six month detentions under the PATRIOT act (see U.S. Code, Title 8, Chapter 12, Subchapter II, Part IV, Section 1226a, "Mandatory detention of suspected terrorists; habeas corpus; judicial review") but, NO, one can't argue that al Marri has undergone a few of those periods, because the Administration didn't invoke that law, and didn't act as required by that law.
IANAL, but, AFAIK, the (possibly multiple) six month detention periods under the PATRIOT act would require the Attorney General to certify and re-certify, every six months, that al Marri wasn't prosecutable and wasn't deportable. And al Marri would have had, under the PATRIOT act, a statutory habeas right, which ain't much, but it's better than nothing.
I guess you could say that the PATRIOT act allows for "unlimited definite detention" or "limited indefinite detention".
But it doesn't allow for the President to do so via the U.S. Navy brig, without the Attorney General, and without habeas review.
Orin Kerr concedes that the Administration could have used the PATRIOT act in al Marri's case, but Kerr argues that the PATRIOT act is only one of multiple tools available to the Administration, and unlimited military detention is just another tool in the toolbox.
http://digbysblog.blogspot.com/2007/06/fasten-your-seat-belts-by-digby.html
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
219 Democrats and one Republican join in favor of the legislation, which passed by a narrow margin
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
Salon headlines in your mailbox
