Letters to the Editor
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AIPAC's peace hunger
They have this item at the top of their ISSUES page:
Iranian Nuclear Activities Rapidly Advancing
The International Atomic Energy Agency's latest report officially details Iran's rapid uranium enrichment advances and Tehran's continued defiance of the U.N. Security Council. Learn more about Iran's dangerous pursuit of atomic arms.
Their nuclear activities are "rapidly advancing," AIPAC warns. Wow. We better do something about that, and quick. What can we do?
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and I should add
At the end, when Rachel knows that Bruce is "playing" Batman, she says that now she knows him, knows that "Bruce Wayne" is not real.
I think this is why the founders chose Publius as their pen name. That's who they imagined themselves being, and they modeled themselves after him. "Publius" liberated them from their labels: Madison, Jay, Hamilton.
Free from his label, Publius was free to define himself.
We are not defining democracy anymore, that's why no one sees it, why it is dissappearing
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@ chris
Standing
They are empowered not to adjudicate any matter that is in dispute, but instead only those cases where one party is injured by the actions of another (hence, the general requirement that a plaintiff prove he has suffered specific/unique injury from a government act in order to have "standing" to challenge the legality of that act).
I understand the reasoning behind this, but shouldn't this be regarded as a factual issue to be decided on the merits, rather than a way to prevent the discovery of the very evidence that could establish standing?
Normally, the allegations in the complaint would be taken on their face absent proof, and discovery would be allowed to determine the actual facts and develop the evidentiary base for trial.
The gummint prevents this by appealing to the "state secrets prvilege" and filing motins for dismissal prior to discovery, and any inquiry into who has been surveilled.
"That's some catch, that Catch-22," he [Yossarian] observed.
"It's the best there is," Doc Daneeka agreed.
Cheers,
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Fred Hiatt's editorial atrocity.....
I'm certainly looking forward to your tackling that one. The number of falsehoods per column inch boggles the mind. I imagine sourcing all the refutations would take several hours.
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Faults in the Constitution
Che, the folks over at Balkinization, God bless 'em, are among the most astute commenters on Constitutional flaws and remedies I know of. If you have concerns about the Electoral College, the imperial Presidency, etc., and you don't follow Jack Balkin and his colleagues' postings already, I can't think of a better place to hang out.
If you do head over for a visit, say hi to Bart for me. ;-)
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Ra' Al Gul
In the movie, Ras Al Gul, the "villain" sees himself as a hero. He's what Batman would have been if he had not learned that its what we do that defines us.
Ras, thinking by calling himself "hero" he was, he was liberated from his conscience and could kill. He became Mark Noonan's "whole man" Everyone else were half-men
In Crime and Punishment, Raskolnikov dreamed of being a "whole man", and thought the rest the world were "newcastratis". but his conscience caught him, it crushed him, and he was redeemed by accepting the lesson that there are no "Great Men".
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this is ancient
what's happening, we've known all along, we just couldn't define it: now it appears
Proverbs 4:16-17
For they sleep not except they have done mischief, and their sleep is taken away unless they have caused some to fall.
That's why their is so much violence in the Old Testament. One group always saw the other side as unhinged. The abyss gazed into them.
"By the pricking of my thumbs, something wicked this way comes" - Shakespeare
Their thumbs are always pricking.
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Standing/Discovery
Arne:
I understand the reasoning behind this, but shouldn't this be regarded as a factual issue to be decided on the merits, rather than a way to prevent the discovery of the very evidence that could establish standing?
This is a really good question (a couple other people asked it earlier) and I honestly don't know the answer. I was hoping someone who did would chime in.
Actually, now that I think about it a little bit more (and having fought through the cold fog), I think I do know the answer:
At the outset of a case, a federal plaintiff is not required to be able to prove with evidence that there is jurisdiction, but they must be able to allege the facts which establish jurisdiction. Prior to discovery, the court will assume that all the facts about jurisdiction alleged by the plaintiff are true, and then ask: "if these allegations are true, is there jurisdiction here?"
In the FISA cases, virtually all plaintiffs cannot even allege that they were subjected to surveillance, becasue they simply have no good faith basis for that allegation. They and their lawyers would likely be sanctioned if they allege it. Thus, all of these complaints are missing what the Government says is a pre-requisite for standing to challenge surveillance activities: namely, that the plaintiff be able to allege that they were subjected to the challeneged surveillance.
If a plaintiff could make that allegation in good faith, then you could have discovery to obtain the relevant evidence and see if that alleagtion is true. But you can't run into a court and tell the court: "We don't know if there is jurisdiction here or not, but we would like to have some discovery to find out." The whole point of jurisdictional requirements is that a case should not proceed unless there is a clear basis for believing the court is constitutionally empowered to adjudicate the case.
I know it's a horrible dilemma. I hate even having to summarize the argument because the outcome is so plainly, glaringly and horribly unjust. But process matters, and constitutional limits on a court's jurisdiction definitely matters.
There may be ways to get around this. The ACLU had some creative arguments for how you can have standing anyway. And this case written about by Singel might provide the way through. Or Congress could get to its FISA investgigations, find out the identity of the parties on whom the administration eavesdropped, and then find a way to empower them to challenge that eavesdropping.
There are solutions here. But if I had to bet, I'd bet (based on the Argument and the law) the Sixth Circuit will reverse on standing, but nobody can predict these things and I've been wrong many times.