10
Nov
Stop The Graham Amendment
Obsidian Wings reports on an amendment intended to prevent courts from hearing any habeas corpus case involving a US detainee. If you think that we’re not as bad as your foreign bad actor of choice, prove it. Follow the link and contact your Senator. John and I agree that this shit is un-American and needs to stop.
physics geek
As a purely legal matter, I don’t believe that non-uniformed enemy combatant non-citizens are entitled to any of the protections afforded to us citizens, including writs of habeas corpus. Having said that, this bill seems like a rotten idea.
Shygetz
physics geek—If we had a useful method to clearly demarcate who is an “enemy combatant” and who is not, I would agree. However, all we have is the word of a politician. As such, they must be afforded rights in order to preserve the rights of the rest of us.
John S.
Shygetz-
That’s really the point of all this. Today’s American citizen could be labelled as tomorrow’s enemy combatant, and who the hell would be able to say otherwise?
Mr Furious
And then, if Cheney has his way it’s off to Eastern Europe for a little tour of wet basements and car batteries…
Would could possiblty be wrong with this?
jcricket
physics_geek, if we didn’t keep releasing 2/3 of the people we claimed for years are the “the worst of the worst”, I might agree. If we didn’t torture and kill people in our prisons for “enemy combatants”, I might agree. If we weren’t detaining American citizens indefinitely under the guise of the WOT, I might agree.
We have shown bad judgement in our designations of who is an enemy combatant and who is merely someone we want information from. Therefore, I don’t think our government deserves the power to indefinitely detain people without any oversight, regardless of their designation.
Kimmitt
Hey, what’s Jose Padilla’s citizenship again?
Mr Furious
Speaking of Graham, anybody else aware of this?
[...]
Can Graham write laws as a senator and then interpret them as a military reserve judge? Does his job as a partisan politician prevent him from being impartial on the bench?
If you count the marching orders R Senators take from the White House, Graham’s in ALL THREE branches at once! Awesome!
KC
It’s hard to believe anyone would propose a law like this. It’s even harder for me to believe Graham would do it.
Zifnab
Shit. I thought there were laws against holding multiple offices like that. So can you be a Supreme Court Justice, a ranking Senator, the Speaker of the House, AND President? That would be totally crazy.
That said, I can’t help but wonder at the legality of such a law and what Congress would do if a sitting justice flipped the provision the bird, declared it unconstitutional, and heard the case anyway.
Steve
If Tom Coburn can’t practice as a doctor any more because of Senate rules, it’s hard to understand how Lindsey Graham can sit as a military judge.
guyermo
Can Senator Coburn still pretend to be a doctor like Bill Frist?
Why do Republicans insist on continually shooting themselves in their feet? Given the now-public knowledge of CIA Prisons and Cheney’s request for a CIA torture exemption, how can Lindsey Graham POSSIBLY see this as a good idea to push for this particular bill at this particular time
BIRDZILLA
More of the kagaroo court stuff aimed at us by the UN and the ICC
Brian
Sure. Let’s give them the same public defenders that street criminals get. Only then will they get the incompetent representation and the jail time they deserve.
The Heretik
I hope people will see we are not on the slippery slope here, we are in the water. More on this at VICTORY?