Forgive me if this has been covered, but I have limited time today for reading previous posts.

Why are right wing extremists so distrustful of our Constitutional freedoms? They seem hell-bent on withdrawing all individual rights from privacy to habeas to equal protection to being safe from illegal search and seizure.

Judging by their responses to Scooter Libby's conviction, they don't want to relinguish their own rights.

Is it that by getting Americans to forfeit their rights and freedoms they can consolidate the power they already enjoy? I believe so.

No higher purpose is served by denying ANYONE in American custody the right to have it PROVED that they are guilty of SOMETHING!

An administration that has been shown to lie to the public, obstruct congress and the courts can not be trusted to hold people without proving a charge.

I wouldn't want my Sainted Mother to have that power! But certainly not people who delete e-mail trails, claim executive privilege for discussions that supposedly didn't include the President and prays State Secrets when they what they really fear is Impeachment.

Please correct me if my reasoning is wrong, but if habeas is extended per the US Supreme Court ruling, won't the government simply have to establish that the prisoner is an "enemy combatant" (that is, establish that the reason for the detainment is because he or she is an enemy combatant with evidence that "proves" this to be the case)? Or has the legitimacy of that designation been struck down?

In addition to ruling that habeas relief was available, the court cast a jaundiced eye on the procedures -- the so-called "CSRT"s -- used to determine the status. Perhaps one reason that this case went the way it did is that recent evidence has shown that these "CSRT"s lack fundamental elements of fairness and due process; had they been a little better cnstructed (and not "rigged" from the beginning, with "do-overs" for the gummint if they didn't like the outcome, lack of lawyers, and means for showing innocence, etc.), the court might have considered the "CSRT"s to have been an adequate substitute for habeas.

More on this by clicking on my sig.

Cheers,

Cheers,

I objected specifically to your first objection to Yoo's article, vis: "Yoo is lying, because he says 'They were fighting against the US,' and they weren't firing a weapon at US soldiers when we took them.'"

This argument, as I pointed out, relies entirely on an insanely narrow definition of "fighting against the US."

No one insisted on this definition. This is your "straw man".

Not to mention your lie: Glenn didn't say "they weren't firing a weapon at US soldiers when we took them". You made that quote up.

Cheers,

Cheers,

Yoo's only mistake was in agreeing that the Bush administration should go along with the decision; they should ignore it, and would be completely within their Constitutionally-granted rights if they did so.

-- Plumb Bob

I think that closes the books on whether or not anybody needs to give your musings any merit.

Yoo needs a red nose, big rubber clown ears, and a pair of size 18-flapping flipper duck-web-shoes. Yoo needs to donn a dunce hat? He'd be able to pass down a clown-dunce-hat and give to his posterity.

A clown act certified, bush weasel certificate, and one that can be suitable for wall framing in a cave-den (iniquity) would be Govt-'ment generous.

Arne can gift wrap left-over wedding gifts and rewrap one for Yoo. It can be a pretty package with a big-pink-bow? A big hair ribbon for his hair?

A baby rattle snake would love Yoo? Yoo wants a fur coat?

He can call the DOD seal-butcher to skin a fuzzy seal coat?

Sheesh! All I mentioned was the process (kind of like GG's article) and not the outcome; the process of how one would prove a negative about WMD.

---

Someone wanted Yoo's ratings: here they are -

http://www.ratemyprofessors.com/ShowRatings.jsp?tid=581083

You have illustrated well how it is not possible to prove a negative.

My only point was that the media simply repeated ad infinitum, that Saddam needed to prove that he had no WMD, and that since that was impossible, it was a foregone conclusion that Bush would have a pretext to invade.

Dumbing down the population, and not teaching them anything about logic, allows you to feed them any BS you like, and tell them it tastes good.

I followed the link and read what you posted.

However, if by your phrase "cast a jaundiced eye", you mean to suggest that that part of the Military Commissions Act which defines "enemy combatant" was not specifically struck down by the Court, then I still see several problems (not the least of which is that, as I understand it, that definition is not in reference to any "battlefield").

However, rather than dwell on the more exotic examples (such as news cameramen or vacationing taxi drivers), horrifying and hard-hitting as they are, let's conjure up an uncontroversial example.

For example, what if you were living in a country that had not attacked the United States, nor had posed any threat of doing so. Let's also say that, despite this, the United States invaded your country and you chose to resist the invasion...

My point, awkwardly made, is that a flexibly conceived of "war" and flexibly-defined "combatants" are the problems that need to be addressed. Extending habeas is (pardon my language) pissing in the wind. Worse, it may encourage the substitution of killing for capturing.

Let me begin by apologizing for my sardonic onslaught - there are days when I feel, well, civil, then there are days when I do not. I hope you'll forgive me, but nothing brings my blood to a boil quicker than the total neglect given to the fact that Saddam did prove the proverbial negative - not just by the process you advocated, he went one better. He filed the very declaration demanded of him, detailing Iraq's disarmament. As I understand it, to this day, it remains the most reliable and authoritative summary of same.

Many are quick to decry the invasion of Iraq, but seem to be ignoring one of the most salient facts establishing precisely why it was a crime. Believing the deck to have been stacked against Hussein does not go far enough, because despite being rigged, Hussein actually succeeded in complying with both the UN resolution and Bush's ultimatum (well, not the revised ultimatum, issued on the eve of war, to leave the country).

Maybe you can see the significance of this oft-overlooked fact?