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Monday, August 26, 2002 |
Ann and the Journal
In today's Journal, they also shed some crocodile tears about Ann Coulter, and how the liberal media is conspiring to silence her.(Though since her book is a #1 best seller, then I guess the liberal media isn't as powerful as the right wing whiners always make it out to be!) According to the Journal, it's OK to talk about bombing newspapers and compare others to Nazis, so long as you're acting out your thoughts in a "what if" kind of theatre (whatever that is). Funny, but while the Journal seems to be in Ms Coulter's court against the liberal media, they certainly don't seem to be offering her a job.
9:48:33 PM Permalink
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I know not what course others may take...
Every time I read a comment about how civil lierties are a luxury in this "time of crisis" I'm reminded of Patrick Henry'sspeech : "Is life so dear, or peace so sweet, as to be purchased at the price of chains and slavery? Forbid it, Almighty God! I know not what course others may take; but as for me, give me liberty or give me death!" That must seem so quaint to all those who think that whatever these guys in Washington want to do as long as we are "safe." That's the end of the speech. Of course, he's arguing in favor of war, and the specifics of the speech include a lot of evidence for the necessity of war. But it's about freedom, not safety. He's arguing in favor of liberty, not sitting at home afraid of our shadows.
9:13:23 PM Permalink
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Dubya and the Sixth
In today's Wall Street Journal, one Robert F. Turner, cofounder of the Center for National Security Law at the University of Virginia School of Law writes this remarkable defense of the government's treatment of Jose Padilla, currently being held without being charged or without benefit of counsel:
To begin with, neither I no most other American citizens today have a right to legal counsel. The Sixth Amendment begins with the words: "In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy" the rights enumerated therein. I have not been charged with a crime nor as Mr. Padilla. His current incarceration is not founded in criminal law but in the president's well-established powers as commander in chief under Aritcle II, Section 2 of the Constitution.
In short, if you aren't being charged with a crime, then you don't have any legal rights.
The section of the Constition he cites reads:
The President shall be commander in chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the militia of the several states, when called into the actual service of the United States; he may require the opinion, in writing, of the principal officer in each of the executive departments, upon any subject relating to the duties of their respective offices, and he shall have power to grant reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States, except in cases of impeachment.
He shall have power, by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, to make treaties, provided two thirds of the Senators present concur; and he shall nominate, and by and with the advice and consent of the Senate, shall appoint ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, judges of the Supreme Court, and all other officers of the United States, whose appointments are not herein otherwise provided for, and which shall be established by law: but the Congress may by law vest the appointment of such inferior officers, as they think proper, in the President alone, in the courts of law, or in the heads of departments.
The President shall have power to fill up all vacancies that may happen during the recess of the Senate, by granting commissions which shall expire at the end of their next session.
Gosh, I'm just a country boy, but I can read, and I don't see anything there about locking people up who the president says are bad guys, and that taking away their Sixth Amendment rights. The Sixth reads:
In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the state and district wherein the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the assistance of counsel for his defense.
Maybe I'm missing the clause that says "unless the president says you're a bad guy." Turner quotes Rhenquist, in a 1987opinion: "we have repeatedly said that the government's regulatory interest in community safety can, in appropriate circumstances, outweigh an individual's liberty interest."
Turner ends with this:
To date, I believe the president has exceeded reasnable expectations in his handling of the crisis. If the government becomes unnecessarily destructive of civil liberties -- as occurred when Americans of Japanese ancestry were incarcerated during World War II, there will be ample time for protests and for both Congress and the Courts to act. But the Jose Padilla matter is clearly not such an occassion.
This is exactly wrong. The time to protest is is precisely before the government goes too far. By protesting now, maybe the government won't go too far and some of this nuttiness can be stopped in its tracks.
9:09:45 PM Permalink
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Bye Bye Barr, alas
Bob Barr is easy to hate; the pursuit of Bill Cinton by the Republicans was, in retrospect, just the first step in the coup that led to Dubya in Washington. But he lost to someone just as "conservative" as he is, so there's no real victory. And as Declan McCullagh points out here, he was principled in the arena of privacy. Good piece; politics do make strange bedfellows.
7:14:19 PM Permalink
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Jebediah Springfield Lives
Slate's Bushism of the day:
"There's no bigger task than protecting the homeland of our country."
"The federal government and the state government must not fear programs who change lives, but must welcome those faith-based programs for the embetterment of mankind."—Stockton, Calif., Aug. 23, 2002 (Thanks to George Dupper.)
Reminds one of Jebediah Springfield's famous line: "A noble spirit embiggens the smallest man."
7:09:13 PM Permalink
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Dylan at Newport redux
To beat a dead horse,here's a terrific report on Dylan at Newport. Greil Marcus is usually pretty hard to read -- long sentences that just don't seem to parse. But this report was written by someone else. It's pretty great. Just 6 or 7 weeks till I next see Bob.
6:56:25 PM Permalink
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DNA Tests Free Man After 17 Years. A judge today freed a man who had been found guilty of raping and murdering a teenage girl in the 1980s. The man had confessed but recent DNA tests showed he couldn't have been the killer. By The Associated Press. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]
It should be painfully obvious that if we'd executed the guy, we wouldn't be able to free him now, nor would we probably even know that we'd put away the wrong person.
3:37:40 PM Permalink
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© Copyright 2004 Steve Michel.
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