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RedditWhen the U.S. Senate voted in September, 2007, on whether to restore habeas corpus protections for those detained by the United States, the senators who would emerge as the presumptive Democratic and Republican nominees for president parted company.
Illinois Democrat Barack Obama embraced the basic Constitutional principle that individuals who are detained by the U.S. government have a right to challenge their detention -- no matter where they are held.
Arizona Republican John McCain rejected the wisdom of the founders of the American experiment and voted against restoring habeas corpus protections for foreign suspects held at Guantαnamo Bay, Cuba, and others who are detained by U.S. authorities.
Today, the Supreme Court said Obama was right and McCain was wrong.
A majority that included conservatives and liberals issued a 5-4 decision holding, in the words of Justice Anthony Kennedy, that, "The laws and Constitution are designed to survive, and remain in force, in extraordinary times."
This was the third time the nation's highest court has rejected the claim of the Bush administration -- and allies such as McCain -- that the military has the authority to hold people it labels "enemy combatants."
During the Democratic presidential primary campaign, more than 125 constitutional lawyers and legal experts signed a "Habeas Lawyers for Obama" letter that read:
Dear Friends:
We are at a critical point in the Presidential campaign, and as lawyers who have been deeply involved in the Guantanamo litigation to preserve the important right to habeas corpus, we are writing to urge you to support Senator Obama.
The Administration's Guantanamo policies have undercut our values at home and stained our reputation around the world. All of us are lawyers who have worked on the Guantanamo habeas corpus litigation for many years, some of us since early 2002, and we were all deeply involved in opposing the Administration's attempt to overturn the Supreme Court's Rasul decision by stripping the courts of jurisdiction to hear the Guantanamo cases. We have talked with Senator Obama about why the Guantanamo litigation is so significant, and we have worked closely with Senator Obama in the fight to preserve habeas corpus.
Some politicians are all talk and no action. But we know from first-hand experience that Senator Obama has demonstrated extraordinary leadership on this critical and controversial issue. When others stood back, Senator Obama helped lead the fight in the Senate against the Administration's efforts in the Fall of 2006 to strip the courts of jurisdiction, and when we were walking the halls of the Capitol trying to win over enough Senators to beat back the Administration's bill, Senator Obama made his key staffers and even his offices available to help us. Senator Obama worked with us to count the votes, and he personally lobbied colleagues who worried about the political ramifications of voting to preserve habeas corpus for the men held at Guantanamo. He has understood that our strength as a nation stems from our commitment to our core values, and that we are strong enough to protect both our security and those values. Senator Obama demonstrated real leadership then and since, continuing to raise Guantanamo and habeas corpus in his speeches and in the debates.
The writ of habeas corpus dates to the Magna Carta, and was enshrined by the Founders in our Constitution. The Administration's attack on habeas corpus rights is dangerous and wrong. America needs a President who will not triangulate this issue. We need a President who will restore the rule of law, demonstrate our commitment to human rights, and repair our reputation in the world community. Based on our work with him, we are convinced that Senator Obama can do this because he truly feels these issues "in his bones."
We urge you to support Senator Obama.
Among the signers of that January 28 letter were: Rear Admiral John Dudley Hutson, U.S. Navy (Ret.), the Judge Advocate General of the Navy from 1997 to 2000 who currently serves as dean and president of Franklin Pierce Law Center; Rear Admiral Donald J. Guter, U.S. Navy (Ret.), the Judge Advocate General of the Navy from 2000 to 2002 who currently serves as dean of Duquesne Law School; Michael Ratner, the president of the Center for Constitutional Rights; and Edwin Chemerinsky, the renowned constitutional law and federal civil procedure scholar and founding dean of the Donald Bren School of Law at the University of California, Irvine.
Of course, Justice Kennedy, a Ronald Reagan appointee, will not be signing the "Habeas Lawyers for Obama" letter. Nor will the other Republican appointees (Justices John Paul Stevens and David Souter) who formed the majority of the court's pro-habeas majority that also included Democratic appointees Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Stephen Breyer. But the justices have made it clear that Obama, a lawyer who has taught constititional law at the University of Chicago Law School, was right in his judgement that -- to, again, quote Kennedy -- "(the framers) deemed the writ (of habeas corpus) to be an essential mechanism in the separation-of-powers scheme."
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At least this much will be a change, our next president will know the law & has never displayed contempt for it, unlike so many presidents we've been subjected to. How far will Obama dare go in resuscitating the Constitution, that will be a key Q in his 1st year.
Posted by sloper at 06/12/2008 @ 12:38pm
I am almost hopeful that the rule of law can be restored - if a court that includes Thomas, Roberts and the Scalito twins is willing to decide thus, maybe we aren't too far gone after all.
Expect the spittle to fly as the howler monkeys of the Neoconistas raise their hideous shrieking to fever pitch.
Posted by skeletonman at 06/12/2008 @ 12:48pm
Well you know what they say, "A bird in the had is worth two in the Bush/Mcain".
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Haha. You can expect to see a lot of this Mary. The way to beat McCain with 70% of the US is to tie him to Bush and show them that he is the same.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 12:51pm
I do not believe the general public will like this ruling. It will be spun against the Dems one way or the other, accurate or not.
Posted by Benchrest at 06/12/2008 @ 12:57pm
Not only is McCain a McSame, but so is the rest of the GOP. They enabled, indeed they cheered on & bullied through the measures that have US in the soup. Time for them all to pay their fair share of the bill.
Posted by sloper at 06/12/2008 @ 12:57pm
I think I'm going to have to Rev Wright/Obama my congressman.----Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
So Jeremiah Wright and Dubya are analogous in your mind?
Okay.
LOL
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008 @ 1:09pm
BTW, how soon until LVLIB shows up to tell us how Anthony Kennedy "wants to allow terrorists to destroy America!!!!"?
heheh
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008 @ 1:10pm
What do we stand for as citizens of the United State of America when we allow our leaders to choose when to respect and abide by the fundamental principles that this country was founded on: "life, liberty, and justice for all". I'm sure that our founding fathers, persons of infinitely greater wisdom and moral character than any of our current or recent leaders, would prefer to have America be at greater risk of a terrorist attack than to betray the fundamental principles on which this great country was founded and for which our sons and daughters are shedding blood to defend as I write these painful words. The greatest attack on America's soil was neither the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1942 nor the terrorist attack on New York City in 2001. It was and continues to be the rape of our founding principles of life, liberty, and justice for all by the current administration that began shortly after 09/11/2001. Since that day our leaders have had the opportunity to give America the moral high ground, to show to our friends and enemies that we are a defender of justice, but instead, they have chosen to desecrate the memories of those who lost their lives on that fateful morning by pursuing the same actions of those who were responsible for the attacks and who we are condemning as terrorists. The illegal and treasonous attack on the principles that define us as a country and that serve as the bedrock on which this great nation has been built has been more harmful than any previous attack. What right do we have to criticize the oppressive actions of others when our government holds prisoner and tortures in order to obtain false confessions persons whom it knows are innocent? More importantly, how do we as proud and patriotic citizens of this country allow such illegal actions to go unpunished? Why do we allow our current leaders to be above the law? Have we regressed back to the Divine Right of Kings I do not think so. Although our leaders WILL ultimately answer to God, they currently also answer to us, the citizens, for we are their judge, jury, and executioner. What do we have left when we betray our own morals for the false perception of safety? What kind of America do we leave behind for our children and grandchildren?
Posted by danconstan at 06/12/2008 @ 1:20pm
I suspect Wright is the only person in the US with lower poll numbers than Bush.
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
I offer into evidence, Dick Cheney.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 1:28pm
Posted by danconstan
here, here....
Posted by leftofcenter at 06/12/2008 @ 1:28pm
"They that can give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." --Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759
Posted by danconstan at 06/12/2008 @ 1:30pm
BTW, how soon until LVLIB shows up to tell us how Anthony Kennedy "wants to allow terrorists to destroy America!!!!"?
heheh
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008
I am waiting for our resident constitutional scholar PONTI.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 1:36pm
Perhaps the rest of the world should concern themselves with the log in their own eye before pointing out the speck in ours.
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
I don't think this was the rest of the world criticizing us. I think this was American lawyers and Senators criticizing us.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 1:43pm
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Oddly, Darin, Anthony Kennedy and 4 others with pretty prestigious law degrees and experience disagree with you on ignoring "specks".
But what do THEY know, huh?
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008 @ 1:45pm
Do US Citizens enjoy the right of Habeus Corpus in Iran? China? Russia? France? How about Canada?
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Who gives a rat's ass?
This is America and we hold ourselves to be different and to a higher standard than any other nation on earth.
If we do not, there is nothing worth defending.
And yes, it really is that simple.
Oh, and no offense to Frosty.
Posted by skeletonman at 06/12/2008 @ 1:46pm
Scalia said the nation is "at war with radical Islamists" and that the court's decision "will make the war harder on us. It will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed."
Sorry, LVLIB. Scalia's reasoning doesn't offer anything even approaching legal analysis. It's a political soundbite.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 1:47pm
danconstan:[quote]The greatest attack on America's soil was neither the bombing of Pearl Harbor in 1942 nor the terrorist attack on New York City in 2001. It was[/quote] to finish your quote with my own opinion- it was when SCOTUS denied the right of this country's citizens to choose their own leader through the basic right to vote. btw this travesty was administered by one person only, ...if any of the treasonous five had cast their vote the other way, there would be no 9/11, no Afghanistan conflict, no Iraq war, no suspension of Habeas Corpus, no unitary executive theory or practice. One man, or woman brought down the whole thing.
Posted by douglaslee at 06/12/2008 @ 1:50pm
I disagree with the decision and this a hugh disappointment. The writ of habeas corpus was designed as a safety measure against unlawful imprisonment for the citizens of the US, not foreign nationals in a time of war. By stripping the military of it's ability to fully prosecute enemy combatants, we will leave ourselves exposed. I know those lawyers are chomping at the bit to open arguments regarding the detainees right to challenge the evidence against their confinement.
One of the first things the lawyers will do is have a bond hearing. Rest assured many of the those detainees (like Sheik Khaled Mohammed) will get bailed out and leave the US.
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008 @ 1:51pm
Canada has this little thing called the Charter of Rights and Freedoms, which is our Bill of Rights on steroids. And yes habeaus corpus is specifically mentioned and nowhere is it limited to Canadian citizens. So try again Mary. In fact, Canadians are stunned at the actions of their neighbours to the south (with a deference to Frosty in the spelling) and the attitude I get from my Canadian friends is, "What happened to you?"
Posted by yutsano at 06/12/2008 @ 1:53pm
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
Well, too bad, Antonin was outvoted...by a REAGAN appointee.
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008 @ 2:01pm
So Mask, this is not merely my view, but 4 of the most notable legal authorities in our country.
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
And the other 5 of the most notable legal authorities in the our country said the opposite. I guess you choose to ignore that fact because it doesn't agree with what you feel. They were outnumbered by equally experienced legal authorities. Some of them MORE experienced considering Alito was only appointed to the Supreme court within the Bush term. Only one of the 5 who voted to overturn was appointed during the Bush term. So overall the people who decided to overturn were more experienced or equally as experienced as the sum total of the people who fought the opposite way. But I guess those peoples opinions are wrong and don't matter because they disagree with you right?
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 2:01pm
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008
And you KNOW for a fact they're all guilty?
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008 @ 2:02pm
By stripping the military of it's ability to fully prosecute enemy combatants, we will leave ourselves exposed.
osted by ACook at 06/12/2008
The problem that you seem to be ignoring ACook is that they are NOT prosecuting the detainees. They are holding them indefinitely without EVER hearing their cases. This does not strip the military of the ability to prosecute. It is forcing the military TO prosecute. Holding a detainee indefinitely does nothing. If you KNOW they are guilty then why not actually prosecute the person? You must be off your ball today to ignore such glaring facts in your assessments.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 2:05pm
Oh yeah, that whole presumption of innocence under the law. Mask you had to bring that up huh? I'm sure that's one of those "Quaint" notions Gonzo wanted to sweep under the rug for his bosses.
Posted by yutsano at 06/12/2008 @ 2:10pm
"By stripping the military of it's ability to fully prosecute enemy combatants, we will leave ourselves exposed."
One of the big problems is that the military has yet to prosecute these enemy combatants after letting them languish at Guantanamo for the past seven years and counting.
Also, prosecution is most effective when the charges are clear and the evidence is strong. There's been a lot of contention about these two crucial elements of justice insofar as the Guantanamo detainees are concerned.
Posted by habiba at 06/12/2008 @ 2:13pm
Is the glass half empty or half full?
The other four Justices are toadies of the Bushes. Two of them gave us Bush v Gore, the worst SC decisions since Dred Scott. The other two were selected by W himself ... and to them loyalty to the Bush brand trumps the Constitution.
... Folks, it's really not any more complicated than that .. EV
Posted by EnviroVarmint at 06/12/2008 @ 2:13pm
Do US Citizens enjoy the right of Habeus Corpus in Iran? China? Russia? France? How about Canada?
One thing I am certain of is that US citizens don't enjoy the right of free speech in Canada or Eruope where they have laws against such a thing.
Right now, Mark Styen is on trial in Canada for hate speech. He was criticizing a television show called Little Mosque on the Praire and said Muslims today are the Gay of the 1990's.
Bridget Bardotte was just convicted (again) for hate speech in France for criticizing Islamic religious customs that slaughter animals.
Perhaps the rest of the world should concern themselves with the log in their own eye before pointing out the speck in ours.
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
You prove Danconstan's point -it's that America is different BECAUSE of our laws! You sound like a second grader when you say, in essence, "They do it, so why can't we?" Those of us who love and respect not just the symbols of America but its legal foundations say that because the rest of the world doesn't respect the basic civil rights due to all people makes it all the more important for us to do so. It's that respect for the rule of law and the equality of all people that makes America the great country it is (or if you and people like you have their way, was).
Patriotism isn't wearing a flag pin on your lapel, it's supporting the rights of all people, especially those whose views or actions we disagree with. To do otherwise is to admit defeat to the terrorists, because we will have let them demean ourselves and we will have become a lesser nation.
The British understood this centuries ago, our founding fathers risked their lives and the lives of their loved ones to get this for America, thousands of brave men and women have risked and sacrificed their lives for this, and you want to give it away because you've been told to be scared.
PATHETIC is what that is!
Posted by Turk33 at 06/12/2008 @ 2:15pm
"And you KNOW for a fact they're all guilty?"
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008
Or do you feel they're all innocent?
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008 @ 2:18pm
"Also, prosecution is most effective when the charges are clear and the evidence is strong. There's been a lot of contention about these two crucial elements of justice insofar as the Guantanamo detainees are concerned."
Posted by habiba at 06/12/2008
Habiba, a lot of that evidence is clear and strong, and it will also reveal what tactical movements our troops used to obtain these guys. Mind you these manuvers are still in play. Are you and the other liberals willing to risk full disclosure?
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008 @ 2:23pm
"And you KNOW for a fact they're all guilty?"
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008
Or do you feel they're all innocent?
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008
Funny, I didn't think it was up to you or mask to decide, but for a court of law (military or otherwise) to determine?
Posted by Turk33 at 06/12/2008 @ 2:23pm
The writ of habeas corpus was designed as a safety measure against unlawful imprisonment for the citizens of the US, not foreign nationals in a time of war.
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008
Your historical account is incorrect; the intent was not that narrow. You should read Section III.A. of Kennedy's opinion, which makes clear through many citations that the historical protections of the writ reached more than "citizens." This section also illustates that apart from providing protection to the individual, the writ was also conceived to be an "essential mechanism in the separation-of-powers scheme." Then read Federalist No. 84.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 2:24pm
Mary has (and obviously always will) reach towards Europe and elsewhere for rectifying arguments (or ignore them when they don't fit). Too bad she never considers the sociopolitical and historical contexts that lead to such differences between nations. It's just all one big McWorld.
Posted by JasonLitz at 06/12/2008 @ 2:26pm
Habiba, a lot of that evidence is clear and strong, and it will also reveal what tactical movements our troops used to obtain these guys. Mind you these manuvers are still in play. Are you and the other liberals willing to risk full disclosure?
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008
Soooo this justifies holding someone in a cell for 3 years without ever prosecuting them of a crime or telling them even why they are being held? I don't think the maneuver takes 3 years.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 2:31pm
Habiba, a lot of that evidence is clear and strong, and it will also reveal what tactical movements our troops used to obtain these guys. Mind you these manuvers are still in play. Are you and the other liberals willing to risk full disclosure?
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008
Also if they are all guilty why do most of them just get let go without any charges ever being given? If those people are guilty they should have been prosecuted and legally imprisoned not held and then released without ever knowing why.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 2:34pm
"This section also illustates that apart from providing protection to the individual, the writ was also conceived to be an "essential mechanism in the separation-of-powers scheme." Then read Federalist No. 84."
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008
Clearly, Hman, it didn't happen in this case.
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008 @ 2:35pm
You must have had a bad day ACook because you are leaning very much toward totalitarianism today and very much away from Democracy. You are undermining much of what America stands for in all of your statements and ignoring some of the most glaringly obvious facts. Maybe you should take a break today.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 2:35pm
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008
Nice dodge.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 2:37pm
"In dissent, Chief Justice John Roberts criticized his colleagues for striking down what he called "the most generous set of procedural protections ever afforded aliens detained by this country as enemy combatants."
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
So they also have real trouble with:
"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal."
Just goes to show you how new cons are such dic'tator philosophy whoreshippers.
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/12/2008 @ 2:41pm
This is America and we hold ourselves to be different and to a higher standard than any other nation on earth.....
.......Oh, and no offense to Frosty.
Posted by skeletonman
none taken.
nationstates will be an anachronism one day.
i'm more worried about individuals holding themselves up to the highest standard...
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/12/2008 @ 2:47pm
Just a moot point to bring up here, but the last few rethug presidential candidates aren't attorneys which means they aren't qualified to give legal advice let alone make decisions on whether or not they are breaking the law, which they seem to be quite good at doing. The last four dem candidates have all been attorneys. This is important when it comes to matters of knowing constitutional law as well as international law.
W, at best, could run a hamburger stand and Cheney is qualified to be the head of one the five families in the mafia.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/12/2008 @ 2:48pm
ACook***Or do you feel they're all innocent?
Until proven guilty, yes. That's another one of those principles that makes this country great, along with Habeus Corpus, the right to a fair and speedy trial, etc, etc, etc...
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 2:49pm
"Soooo this justifies holding someone in a cell for 3 years without ever prosecuting them of a crime or telling them even why they are being held? I don't think the maneuver takes 3 years."
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008
First off, the gitmo detainees know why they're there. Secondly, it's the lawyers who keep saying they don't to bolster their case.
Thirdly, military manuevers that have proven beneficial keeps our troop ahead of the game and alive. Full disclosure will take away that advantage.
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008 @ 2:50pm
"the most generous set of procedural protections ever afforded aliens detained by this country as enemy combatants."
<snort> As if we have a long history of aliens detained as enemy combatants. If memory serves, the concept of "enemy combatants", as opposed to "Prisoners of War", was dreamed up by this administration.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 2:52pm
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/12/2008
I thought Scalia's stunning legal argument that the majority decision will "almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed" was particularly Bush-like in its fear-mongering quality.
An embarrassment that this sort of garbage came from someone on the country's highest court.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 2:54pm
Scalia said the nation is "at war with radical Islamists"
What a political tool! War has a definite legal definition, can be only declared by Congress, and Congress has never declared war on anyone, much less radical islamists, since 1941.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 2:55pm
"You must have had a bad day ACook because you are leaning very much toward totalitarianism today and very much away from Democracy. You are undermining much of what America stands for in all of your statements and ignoring some of the most glaringly obvious facts. Maybe you should take a break today."
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008
Why am I having a bad day? I understand what America stands for and I don't hate this country, but at what price are you willing to pay to cast your pearls among swine?
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008 @ 2:56pm
Scalia should be impeached. He's not a jurist be any stretch of the imagination.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 2:56pm
Scalia should be impeached. He's not a jurist be any stretch of the imagination.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008
Here here. Scalia is a moron with a robe acting like a justice. He'd do better behind a pulpit at a southern baptist church or maybe one of those evangelical churches that heal people with but a touch of the hand of the grand pastor. Same goes for Alito and Roberts.
It's pretty bad when the "liberal" looking judges were appointed by Reagan and Bush senior.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:03pm
The posters who are claiming to love America are the ones supporting the diminishment of what makes this country great, and the posters who are continually called un-American and appeasers are the ones defending the Constitution and basic legal structures that make this the greatest country in the history of the world.
Posted by Turk33 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:04pm
"What a political tool! War has a definite legal definition, can be only declared by Congress, and Congress has never declared war on anyone, much less radical islamists, since 1941."
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008
Oh yes they did and yes they have. The "use of force" is the same as declaring war. The constitution makes no distinction of that.
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008 @ 3:05pm
Scalia is a moron with a robe acting like a justice.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/12/2008
He's not a moron, he's an extremist ideologue - the end result's the same, but the path is a little less clear.
Posted by Turk33 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:06pm
Habiba, a lot of that evidence is clear and strong, and it will also reveal what tactical movements our troops used to obtain these guys. Mind you these manuvers are still in play. Are you and the other liberals willing to risk full disclosure?
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008
Have you ever heard of a gag order by a court?
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:08pm
New con supremacists...
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/12/2008 @ 3:11pm
Where is Pontificus declaring that Bush has never lost a court case?
habeous is a fundemental right of all people, or should be. If you want to see what a country is like without this basic legal tool, check out some of the most well known:
China
cuba
Tajikistan
Iraq under Saddam
Burma
ACOOK, is this what you strive to mirror?
Posted by crabwalk at 06/12/2008 @ 3:16pm
CRAB -
Don't bother. ACook thinks habeas covers only US citizens.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:20pm
Or do you feel they're all innocent?----- Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008
Innocent until proved guilty....yeah...
I'm wacky that way.
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008 @ 3:21pm
Why am I having a bad day? I understand what America stands for and I don't hate this country, but at what price are you willing to pay to cast your pearls among swine?
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008
What price are you willing to pay for short term security? The desecration of everything America stands for. If we are willing to destroy everything that America stands for in order to stay secure then the terrorists won when they took down our towers. Their goal is not the obliteration of a country but to affect a change in which the country obliterates itself.
Someone quoted it earlier but I will say it again.
"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety."
The most essential truth of America and one I hold fully in my logic.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:22pm
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
So, in your opinion, five justices of the Supreme Court should be lined up and shot?
I just want to be clear on what you are advocating.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:26pm
Well to live up to my name if GITMO is not American soil, and therefore, acording to the republicans, our laws do not apply there. Then if John McCain was born on a military base in Panama, he is a foreign born citizen not a natural born citizen and does not qualify to be president. BTW does anyone know the history of illegal enemy combatant, did the bush administration make it up?
Posted by Extraneous at 06/12/2008 @ 3:26pm
Dangerous ideologues committed to the downfall of our Constitutional Republic.
We used to incarcerate and even shoot traitors. Today we just call them the "anti-war left"
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
You have once again proven that you really are an sob.
You talk about preserving the constitution and then turn around is shit all over it. So which one is it non-liberty? Do you believe in following the constitution or just going whichever way the wind blows in a particular day to get what you want?
You are the one who is the traitor. These guys can be tried, evidence can be presented, the trial can be fair and the evidence and transcripts can be withheld from anyone aside from the court.
Are you afraid that W and company broke the hell out of the law and these guys are going to walk after committing murder? If they do walk, it's W's fault for breaking the law, not ours.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:32pm
So, in your opinion, five justices of the Supreme Court should be lined up and shot?
I just want to be clear on what you are advocating.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008
So speaks the reverend Nazi.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:35pm
So speaks the reverend Nazi.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/12/2008
Yes. Pretty sad he calls himself Love Liberty.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:38pm
lvliberty***Dangerous ideologues committed to the downfall of our Constitutional Republic.
Sounds like you are describing the Christian Right here...
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 3:41pm
Guantanamo is full of people 'turned' in by people for the promised monetary reward. Reminds me of the Salem witch trials when people were accused of being witches as an expedient way of getting 'rid' of them by their enemies.
There the similarity ends. The witches were accused and tried in court.
Posted by felicity at 06/12/2008 @ 3:45pm
ACook***The "use of force" is the same as declaring war.
The February 6, 2006, testimony of Alberto Gonzales to the U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee Hearing on Wartime Executive Power and the National Security Agency's Surveillance Authority:
GONZALES: There was not a war declaration, either in connection with Al Qaida or in Iraq. It was an authorization to use military force. I only want to clarify that, because there are implications. Obviously, when you talk about a war declaration, you're possibly talking about affecting treaties, diplomatic relations. And so there is a distinction in law and in practice. And we're not talking about a war declaration. This is an authorization only to use military force.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 3:48pm
NEWS: Shortly after German-born Murat Kurnaz arrived at Camp Delta, intelligence reports show the plan was to let him go. What happened?
By Mariah Blake
March 10, 2008
They discussed their findings with CIA and Pentagon officials, then boarded a plane back to Germany. During a stopover in Washington, D.C., one of the agents visited the local branch of Germany's foreign intelligence service, the BND, and reported back to headquarters via a secure phone line, saying: "USA considers Murat Kurnaz's innocence to be proven. He should be released in approximately six to eight weeks." A few days later, a Pentagon release form for the detainee was printed and awaiting signature.
But Kurnaz was not set free. Instead, he spent another four years languishing at Guantanamo, where he was repeatedly designated an "enemy combatant," despite evidence showing he had no known links to terrorist groups.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/12/2008 @ 3:50pm
ON AUGUST 24, 2006, a C-17 cargo plane touched down at Ramstein Air Base, a U.S. military installation 44 miles southwest of Frankfurt. Shackled to the floor in its cargo hold was detainee 061, his face wrapped in a mask and his eyes covered by goggles with blacked-out lenses. Standing watch over him were 15 American soldiers.
On the tarmac, he was handed over to German police, who asked that his handcuffs be removed. Then they escorted him to a nearby Red Cross installation, where his family was waiting.
The reunion was bittersweet: His mother couldn't stop crying, and his father was so withered and gray that at first Kurnaz mistook him for an older uncle. During the car ride home, a journey of more than 250 miles, Kurnaz learned that his wife, Fatima--the reason he says he traveled to Pakistan--had filed for divorce. All those years with no word from him were more than she could handle. Later in the trip, his father pulled over at a rest stop and his mother poured him some coffee from a thermos in the trunk. Kurnaz was so busy marveling at the stars, which had been drowned out by the floodlights at Guantanamo, that he forgot to drink it.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/12/2008 @ 3:52pm
Lvliberty-Love of America is not defined as agreeing with you.Sorry.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/12/2008 @ 3:52pm
"And we're not talking about a war declaration. This is an authorization only to use military force."
Q: If Gonzales knows the difference, why doesn't Scalia?
A: Because he's a tool.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 3:54pm
"Scalia should be impeached. He's not a jurist be any stretch of the imagination.Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 Here here. Scalia is a moron with a robe acting like a justice. "
Tony S is no moron. He's a very clever Opus Dei ideologue, i.e. a fascist.
He should be impeached (Abe Fortas had to quit for taking less from fewer than Scalia has), but don't hold your breaths, folks.
One of the (probably few) benefits of an Obama presidency will be SC appointments to outweigh the OD fascists.
Posted by sloper at 06/12/2008 @ 3:55pm
UK man released from Guantanamo
Bisher al-Rawi
Mr al-Rawi has lived in the UK for nearly 20 years A British resident is back in the UK after being held in Guantanamo Bay for almost five years.
Bisher al-Rawi, an Iraqi national, was held at the US detention camp in Cuba on suspicion of links to terrorism while on a trip to Gambia in 2002.
In a statement Mr Rawi, a businessman from south-west London, said: "I am delighted to be back home in England, with my family."
Mr Katznelson went on: "Right to the end they treated him with brutality, on the way to the plane in Guantanamo - they knew he was leaving - they insisted still on shackling him, blindfolding him, putting on earmuffs so he couldn't hear a thing and keeping him in the back of a very hot , very confined van on the way to the plane."
However the lawyer praised the way the British authorities treated his client after the handover.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/12/2008 @ 3:56pm
We used to incarcerate and even shoot traitors. Today we just call them the "anti-war left"
Posted by lvliberty1
actually very few. and even fewer executed. Liverty just makes this stuff up.
United States Robert Henry Best, convicted of treason on April 16, 1948 and served a life sentence John Brown, convicted of treason against the Commonwealth of Virginia Iva Toguri D'Aquino, who is frequently identified with "Tokyo Rose." {perjured testimony}. Subsequently pardoned by President Gerald Ford Governor Thomas Dorr 1844, convicted of treason against the state of Rhode Island; see Dorr Rebellion; released 1845; civil rights restored 1851; verdict annulled 1854. Mildred Gillars, "Axis Sally," convicted of treason on March 8, 1949, served 12 years of a 10- to 30-year prison sentence Tomoya Kawakita, sentenced to death for treason, but eventually released by President John F. Kennedy to be deported to Japan Martin James Monti, United States Army Air Force pilot, convicted of treason for defecting to the Waffen SS in 1944 Adam Yahiye Gadahn, convicted of treason for pledging allegiance to Al Qaeda in 2006.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 3:57pm
Dangerous ideologues committed to the downfall of our Constitutional Republic.
We used to incarcerate and even shoot traitors. Today we just call them the "anti-war left"
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
We also incarcerated fascists which is what you are.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:57pm
"Have you ever heard of a gag order by a court?"
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/12/2008
Absolutely. But gag orders are lifted all the time. I'm almost certain if a gag order is put into place, the press will challenge it.
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008 @ 3:58pm
The America hating leftists here (and yes, today all of you are supporting hatred and destruction of the US) are passionate in their desire to usurp International law and afford these people dedicated to our destruction, rights greater than those afforded POW's.
Indeed I will not relent in labelling most of you what you truly are:
Dangerous ideologues committed to the downfall of our Constitutional Republic.
We used to incarcerate and even shoot traitors. Today we just call them the "anti-war left"
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
Do you know how much of a raving idiot you sound like? You sound like all those radicals you insult all the time. Jesus what is wrong with our local conserves today they have all gone insane. Can a conserve here come and give us a breath of sanity for God's sake.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 3:59pm
Dangerous ideologues committed to the downfall of our Constitutional Republic.
We used to incarcerate and even shoot traitors. Today we just call them the "anti-war left"
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
Funny that you say this because 3 of the 5 who voted to overturn were put in place by YOUR party.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 4:07pm
to convict someone for treason is very difficult here. Liverty who is a totalitarean would be more comfortable in countries where it's easy to convict someone for treason. like on his appellation of same.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 4:10pm
It's refresing to know that when Senator Obama moves into the White House he will have a fundamental understanding of the importance of the law to the survival of the Republic. And when President Obama runs bush out of the White House(literally and figuratively), he will be running out an illegitimate pretender whose entire life has been an exercise in skirting, bashing, trampling, and outwardly defying the very laws that that he promised to uphold when he took the oath of office. Consider Obama the Protector of the Constitution and Savior of the Republic!
Posted by RPerry at 06/12/2008 @ 4:10pm
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
I want to point out something to everyone here by the way. THIS is the person who is saying he is trying to protect America. He is advocating the shooting of 36% of this country because they have a view point that is different than his. A "man of God" is advocating mass murder in order to prevent views that are different than his. You know who else advocated that? Saddam, Hitler, Stalin and many, many other dictators.
THESE are the people who deem themselves the saviors of America and "men of God." What ridiculously hypocritical and disgusting human beings.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 4:13pm
people dedicated to our destruction Posted by lvliberty1
This is the big assumption that the right is making and it is the justification they need to live with themselves. We do not know who all the detainees are or even if they deserve to be there, as far as I know they were just in the wrong place at the wrong time. We need open trials, to determine if these people were part of 911 or not. Even if they killed US soldiers in Afghanistan they should be treated respectfully as POWs at a minimum, as we were an invading force... I do not see how having open trials at this point in time could threaten us security as 5 years later there are no secrets these people have or would come out in a trial that would still be relevant to impair our inteligence operations.
Posted by Extraneous at 06/12/2008 @ 4:13pm
lvliberty***I did not call any of the Justices anti-war leftists. I left that label for the leftist bloggers here.
So they should all be shot? <snort> And you call yourself a man of God!
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 4:13pm
Cccomfo1***A "man of God" is advocating mass murder in order to prevent views that are different than his.
He beautifully illustrates the wisdom and necessity of maintaining the separation of Church and State.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 4:15pm
Absolutely. But gag orders are lifted all the time. I'm almost certain if a gag order is put into place, the press will challenge it.
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008
I would highly doubt that. If top secret or higher information where national security truly hangs in the balance, the court will put a permanent gag order on the hearing and seal all of the documents and no challenge would open them back up.
Kind of like what is going to happen to all of the white house records incriminating the Bush administration. It will be sealed, put in his daddy's library and never seen again until he's been dead for 20 years.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/12/2008 @ 4:16pm
I did not call any of the Justices anti-war leftists. I left that label for the leftist bloggers here.
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
Well, the main thing the "leftist bloggers" are doing here is agreeing with the decision, so I do not see the distinction.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 4:16pm
Sorry, LVLIB. Scalia's reasoning doesn't offer anything even approaching legal analysis. It's a political soundbite.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008
My...my... Isn't Scalia supposed to be strict constructionist of the Constitution. Hilarious. Talk about politicizing the Supreme Court. Good Call Hman......I'm afraid the Preacher doesn't understand the irony and hypocrisy however. We do though.
Posted by OneVote at 06/12/2008 @ 4:18pm
So its only the leftist bloggers here that should be shot then, Liverty?
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 4:18pm
they still don't post the friggin' posts at the bottom. amateurs.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 4:19pm
We used to incarcerate and even shoot traitors. Today we just call them the "anti-war left"----Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
So first off, we get an idea as to how LVLIB would run things if we "went back to the Good Ol' Days".
And he'd still consider himself an "American"...more the land than the idea, I guess.
Second, he's been making these generalizations for a few days now.
Anybody who doesn't support drilling in ANWR "wants America to go down"....then he casually forgets that MCCAIN doesn't want to drill in ANWR.
Then it's anybody who believes in global warming is helping a "socialist agenda"....again...MCCAIN onboard for that.
So he's just called the man he's going to VOTE FOR a "socialist who wants America to fall".
Now, he has allusions to the 5 of 9 Supreme Court justices and EXECUTING "similar" individuals.
Again, we're seeing the "collapse of the Right" ...uh....RIGHT before our eyes, so to speak.
They see it all slipping away...even with McCain....and it's driving them nutty.....uh...'ier.
heheh
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008 @ 4:20pm
The British understood this centuries ago, our founding fathers risked their lives and the lives of their loved ones to get this for America, thousands of brave men and women have risked and sacrificed their lives for this, and you want to give it away because you've been told to be scared.
PATHETIC is what that is!
Posted by Turk33 at 06/12/2008 |
Right on Turk! Remember we rebelled against the monarchy that was given the Parliament as bone with no teeth on it. Comparing our laws to that of Europe (and Canada as the good child colony of Britain) isn't fair. Our founding fathers had a different idea.
It is wonderful to see the Constitution being upheld. Happy Day.
It will be great to have a President who has an understanding of the Constitution!
Posted by OneVote at 06/12/2008 @ 4:25pm
OneVote***It is wonderful to see the Constitution being upheld. Happy Day.
Indeed. Only someone who doesn't belive in The Constitution, who hates America, would feel otherwise.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 4:31pm
They see it all slipping away...even with McCain....and it's driving them nutty.....uh...'ier.
heheh
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008 | ignore this person | warn this person
Now I know what the Preacher's disablility is: mental.
There are coming to take him away hahaheehee to the funny farm........
Posted by OneVote at 06/12/2008 @ 4:33pm
Indeed. Only someone who doesn't belive in The Constitution, who hates America, would feel otherwise.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 | ignore this person | warn this person
God (whoever whatever that is) Bless America! Fellow Patriots, never give up hope that we are going ti win this battle. Gosh its feels good. Separation of Powers.....Yes!
Posted by OneVote at 06/12/2008 @ 4:36pm
... Remember we rebelled against the monarchy that was given the Parliament as bone with no teeth on it. Posted by OneVote
this is just not true. in fact most of the beef with the "home office" was with Parliament, which was quite strong and independent.
king George would not have dared to monkey with habeas, something our George did with impunity. it is our present Parliament which is toothless.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 4:36pm
2008 Presidential Election Weekly Poll
http://www.votenic.com
Run By a Kid.
Posted by votenic at 06/12/2008 @ 4:52pm
Posted by votenic at 06/12/2008
Go buy an ad. Most of us do not appreciate the spam.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 4:55pm
McCave McContinuation of MchsuB's McUnconstitutional McCrimes...
McCain In 2005: I "Totally" Support Bush On The "Transcendent Issues" (VIDEO) stumble digg reddit del.ico.us news trust buzz up June 12, 2008 11:46 AM
http://tinyurl.com/5fs4jd
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/12/2008 @ 4:55pm
You do not try POW's in a civil court
and yet that is exactly what the supremes have ruled.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 5:04pm
We used to incarcerate and even shoot traitors. Today we just call them the "anti-war left"----Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
Been through this before. What say you to the list of conservatives I gave you last week that are against the war in Iraq?
Pat Buchanon, Leader of the Anti-war "left"? Bill Buckley, a part of the "socialist left"?
come out of your box, see the world in 2008, not through the lenses of 1964.
When will this "war" against Islamo-fascists be over? Where is the battlefield?
Answers- Never
Everywhere.
Where does that leave the law?
Answer- where ever Chimpy says it should be. Till Obama takes office. Then we will hear the whining, and we get to say "He is the President, trust him, OBEY him!!!!'.
Obedience to authority, what more can a con ask for?
Posted by crabwalk at 06/12/2008 @ 5:04pm
Obey Obama!!
Better than obeying Opie/Deputy Fife/Bush
Posted by crabwalk at 06/12/2008 @ 5:09pm
I believe in using the same standards as the Geneva Convention. The reason that these prisoners were not labelled POW's is because they do not meet the criteria laid out in Geneva. That does not mean that we should not treat them and prosecute them the same was as Geneva calls for. That is what Bush has done and what Congress approved with the Military Commissions Act.
You do not try POW's in a civil court nor should these where you introduce the danger of revealing national security details. Furthermore, the rules of evidence for military commissions under Geneva are far different than for civilian trials.
I am the patriot because I want to preserve our participation in International Law, and people like yourself do not.
It has nothing to do with your nonsensical statement about Bush breaking the law. the war was legal and within the authority of the president.
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
We aren't advocating trying them in civil court. We are trying to get them tried at all. Do you not pay attention or just remain willfully ignorant. These people are not being tried at all. That;'s what the problem is. They are being held for an indeterminate amount of time without ever being tried at all.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 5:09pm
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008
No...what we are witnessing is the disintegration of our republic in the name of marxist/socialist, global government, anti G-d, ant-freedom ideology.
As I've said Mask, the past few months have shown that you are far more to the left than you used to insinuate. At the end of the day, there is little that seperates you and a Trotskyist like CKA2ND.
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/200
YEAAAAHHHH executing people for having different views is really freedom LV. You have lost it dude.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 5:10pm
come out of your box, see the world in 2008, not through the lenses of 1964.
liverty sees the world through 1564 lenses.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 5:10pm
"I would highly doubt that. If top secret or higher information where national security truly hangs in the balance, the court will put a permanent gag order on the hearing and seal all of the documents and no challenge would open them back up."
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/12/2008
I wouldn't doubt it, we're talking civillian courts here. Not all jurists are familiar with national security matters. The Gitmo case will go straight to the lower federal courts first.
Posted by ACook at 06/12/2008 @ 5:10pm
No...what we are witnessing is the disintegration of our republic in the name of marxist/socialist, global government, anti G-d, ant-freedom ideology.
As I've said Mask, the past few months have shown that you are far more to the left than you used to insinuate. At the end of the day, there is little that seperates you and a Trotskyist like CKA2ND.
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
It's a plot by the scientists of the world to take over and create a Giant Cuba/Finland all over the World, granting asylum to every Islamo-fascist Unibomber welfare Queen Trotsky wannabe!!
BOO!
Posted by crabwalk at 06/12/2008 @ 5:12pm
Let me pose a Constitutional question to you LVL. Can a declaration of war without the authority of Congress be legal? And is the phrase "military action" anywhere in the Constitution? And going to your international law argument, is the detainment of those under the age of 18 years old against international law?
Posted by yutsano at 06/12/2008 @ 5:13pm
Lvl has completely lost it dude. Jesus Christ. a "man of God" is promoting mass murder. What a damn lunatic.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 5:15pm
So, ACCOK, LUVVY
Exactly what "freedoms" are you finger fighting for?
NOT the freedom to question authority
Not the freedom to see the evidence brought against defendants
NOT the freedom to be tried in an open court
NOT the freedom to be told the charges against defendants
NOT the freedom to be free from unreasonable search and siezure by the federalis
NOT the freedom to not be held without charges brought
The freedom to pee your pants in fear?
OK, boys and girls, time to invest in Depends, work the system for your personal gain!
Posted by crabwalk at 06/12/2008 @ 5:16pm
is just not true. in fact most of the beef with the "home office" was with Parliament, which was quite strong and independent.
king George would not have dared to monkey with habeas, something our George did with impunity. it is our present Parliament which is toothless.
Posted by emile duBois (Johannes Rolf Posing as a Person with French Derivation Name In Order to Cover Foolishness that May be Ascribed to Persons of German Ancestry if he were to use his Real Name) at 06/12/2008
Okay Johannes...whatever you say. I don't know what they taught you on the kibbutz but maybe they ran out of textbooks dealing with American history.
'The document, formally entitled The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,[1] explained the justifications for separation from the British crown,'........ Wikipedia
Bill of Particulars in support of said Declaration....
Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world. He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness of his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.
In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.
Source: Wikipedia
Posted by OneVote at 06/12/2008 @ 5:17pm
the king was the titular head of the gov't.
you will have to read a bit more history before you can attempt to argue with your betters.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 5:21pm
and what was this bullshit with the kibbutz, you anti semitic bastard?
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 5:22pm
LV you forgot to rail against the pinko activist judges.
We'll be Sweden in no time. I can see it now...
80% tax.
Everyone kickin' back on the government teet
Mexico rushes the border
We can't defend ourselves cause guns are outlawed...
China lands 6000 747 repopulates our fair cities
The Forbes 500 become State property
Kim Jong Il and Obama fist bump on the podium
LV and Mark Canyon shave their heads, grab the ol glory and head for the mountains
Osama bangs the gavel at the NYSE
Allah is proclaimed supreme deity
Hagee and Falwell and Pat Robertson break down, get triple gay married
Posted by winyahn at 06/12/2008 @ 5:28pm
the king was the titular head of the gov't.
you will have to read a bit more history before you can attempt to argue with your betters.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 |
I will let my last post speak for yourself. As for your opinion, all you have proffered is I am Johannes Rolf and I have a following here who gloriously bow down before me and follow every word I say without consideration of the facts because I am Johannes Rolf, master of Germanic history and the classics -
Say, you aren't related to Wohlsletter are you?
Posted by OneVote at 06/12/2008 @ 5:30pm
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Have you read it? Or just Best Web's take?
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 5:34pm
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Sorry, I just read your second post.
You have not read the decision.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 5:35pm
"We therefore do not question the Government's position that Cuba, not the United States, maintains sovereignty, in the legal and technical sense of the term, over Guantanamo Bay."
Pgae 23 of the Majority Opinion.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 5:38pm
So the MBB/NeoCon logic (if we can stretch to call it that) is that torture, permanent uncharged detention, etc., etc. .. are hunky dory as long as we do it someplace else?
And they wonder why they're getting voted out?
Posted by leftofcenter at 06/12/2008 @ 5:43pm
osted by marybretbrad at 06/12/200
FINALLY, a rational thought out argument. Not someone talking about the mass murder of 38% of the American population.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 5:43pm
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
Larry, you're calling for the execution on "treason" who don't support a war we now are getting EVIDENCE was at the least "fudged"....
and you think everything, but the Interstate and NASA, since 1880 is "socialism"...
So naturally, you'd think I was a "Marxist" given everybody INCLUDING McCAIN falls into your category of "leftist".
I take your analysis of my politics for EXACTLY what it's worth.
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008 @ 5:44pm
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Darin, who nominted Anthony Kennedy?
One of them durn left-wing Presidents?
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008 @ 5:45pm
Posted by winyahn
LOL ... classic
Posted by leftofcenter at 06/12/2008 @ 5:45pm
There are Conservatives who believe the ACLU throws a party every time a child molester goes free on a technicality. I suppose now they will accuse Liberals of throwing a party everytime a terrorist who murdered Americans goes free.
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Well, scroll up Darin.
There is at least one conservative who believes that if you support habeas rights in this case you should be lined up and shot.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/12/2008 @ 5:47pm
I don't know, but I'm sure he regrets it today.-----Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Well, he died in 2004....and you don't know that.
Like most things, you just "feel" that, right?
Posted by Mask at 06/12/2008 @ 5:53pm
I don't know, but I'm sure he regrets it today.
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Do you believe we should all be lined up and shot Darin?
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 5:58pm
emile ... the obvious is that BushCo has created the farcical (if unfunny) "enemy noncombatants" as a means to circumvent all normal lawful controls. If they were POWs then they'd have to (or at least supposedly) behold to the Geneva Conventions. If they were anything other, it should be a civil matter. By loosely defining this "grey area" they get to do whatever they please ... well, until now that is.
Charge or release as anything else is unconscionable. Should we leave them locked up until Iraq is "safe?" Guess we'll be shipping their bones home in a hundred years or so - per McSame's view.
Posted by leftofcenter at 06/12/2008 @ 6:00pm
Scalia said the nation is "at war with radical Islamists" and that the court's decision "will make the war harder on us. It will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed."
"They that can give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." --Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759
hmmm...lets see...Ben Franklin was a signatory of the declaration of independence and the constitution, nevermind that he was a genius. I think I will take his side over... ummm... Scalia... lol!
Perhaps the courts decision will make the "war" harder on us. Even if Scalia is right, the point is that a true American partiot is willing to sacrifice a little bit of safety in order to support the priciples of "life, liberty, and justce for all" that DEFINE this country. Our troops in Afganistan have been fighting for our saftey, but also for the liberties that we pride ourselves on (I don't know what our troops in Iraq have been fighting for cause ther were no islamic terrorists in Iraq when we invaded). If we give up our liberties for a little more security America is NO LONGER America.
Posted by danconstan at 06/12/2008 @ 6:04pm
a true American partiot is willing to sacrifice a little bit of safety in order to support the priciples of "life, liberty, and justice for all"
Posted by danconstan at 06/12/2008
Indeed. Did not our founding fathers sacrifice more than a little bit of THEIR safety in order to GIVE us those sacred principles?
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 6:11pm
sacrifice? sacred? you guys are making a religion out of it. a very poor idea.
the revolutionary war was not about ideals, it was about mercantile issues.
it was not about freedom and it was not about democracy. it was about money.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 6:15pm
Emeny combatans is whatever King George chooses it to be Mary. With such an arbitrary standard applied, habeas becomes even more vital, because punishing innocents just because they're in the wrong place at the wrong time is against the very fabric of our nation. But oh wait, there is no such thing as an innocent Muslim to you. Never mind.
Posted by yutsano at 06/12/2008 @ 6:22pm
Well, I sure hope Bush has learned his lesson. All enemy combatants must be left on the battlefield with a bullet in the head.
That's the only policy that is sure to hold up to SCOTUS review.
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Problem is many people have admitted that a lot of people being held at Gitmo are innocent.
Also overtime we have that mentality we always get incidents like the Blackwater troops shooting 17 unarme women and children in the street
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 6:24pm
Six out of 270 after six years. Yeah, I feel MUCH better now LVL. And thank you for completely ducking my questions.
Posted by yutsano at 06/12/2008 @ 6:25pm
sacrifice? sacred? you guys are making a religion out of it. a very poor idea.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008
I regard The Constitution as almost sacred. Not sure that's a "poor" idea.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 6:28pm
these principles are not and were not ever sacred. they were ignored from the start. and they are being ignored right now by the occupant of the white house.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 6:29pm
You are wrong. We began the trials of Kalik Sheik Mohammad and 4 other detainees last week
"The proceedings here offered the first public glimpse of the 43-year-old whom U.S. officials accuse of conceiving and executing the most deadly crime in American history. But the contentious start this morning only underscored the difficulties the Pentagon is expected to encounter in putting Mohammed and four alleged co-conspirators on trial--a case that has become a top priority for the Bush administration.
The proceeding today is technically only an arraignment--a formal reading of the charges against the five co-defendants. But it comes amid intense controversy over the legitimacy and fairness of the military tribunal system."
http://www.newsweek.com/id/140159?from=rss
And the Australian, David Hicks was convicted last year and is serving out his sentence in Australia
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
And how many other people have waited 3 or 4 years? You remember the case they wrote about on here of the guy who was tortured. Proven to be innocent. Then held for 2 and a half years after that before they were willing to let him go?
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 6:30pm
the revolutionary war was not about ideals, it was about mercantile issues.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008
Certainly, mercantile issues fanned the initial spark, but ideals fed the flames. The average Continental Soldier or local Militiaman was not fighting for "mercantile issues". The Southern Campaign against Cornwallis, which led to his defeat at Yorktown, was fought mostly by Militiamen who were defending their homes and their families.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 6:34pm
these principles are not and were not ever sacred
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008
They are to me.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 6:35pm
I'll explain why it is a poor idea to make a religion out of it.
religions operate on faith not facts. people do not regard their religion with sharp rational thinking.
if you make a religion out of the constitution, it may prevent you from seeing clearly the many times its prescriptions have been ignored.
religions rely on dogma. the constitution was not written as dogma. it contains many contradictions.
religions generally do not allow for questioning their tenets. this would be a terrible prescription for our constitution and our civil life.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 6:35pm
they are being ignored right now by the occupant of the white house.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008
On that,we are in complete agreement.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 6:37pm
by Militiamen who were defending their homes and their families.
Posted by Balrog
New englanders were down south defending their homes and families?
the casus belli was certainly not ideals of freedom and democracy.
the constitution was written well after the war ended.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 6:39pm
I'll explain why it is a poor idea to make a religion out of it.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008
Well, Emile, I don't belong nor subscribe to any particular religion. The Constitution is probably the one and only man-made document that I believe in.
Your objections to religion sound very close to mine.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 6:44pm
Balrog
the damn thing, the constitution, was a lie for most of its existence.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 6:49pm
"Let's call it what it is:
Reprieve said their client, Binyam Mohamed, had his genitals slashed repeatedly with a doctor's scalpel while in custody in Morocco after he was flown there from Pakistan by American officials in 2002. It also said his U.S. captors later took pictures of the abuse to show authorities that his wounds were healing."
Wow. This is what American detainees get? Yeah they are being treated great LVL.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 6:51pm
A broken watch could outperform Obambi. Even a broken watch is right twice a day.
I score Obamas habeas corpus once right in oh.... a year or more?
Has he been right on anything else?
Posted by JohnnyAtWork at 06/12/2008 @ 6:51pm
New englanders were down south defending their homes and families?
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008
The Battle of Cowpens was fought on January 17, 1781, during the Southern campaign of the American Revolutionary War and was an overwhelming victory by American Revolutionary forces under Brigadier General Daniel Morgan. It was a turning point in the reconquest of South Carolina from the British, and went down in history as the great American tactical masterpiece of the war.
The Colonial forces were commanded by Brigadier-General Daniel Morgan. Although Morgan claimed in his official report to have had only a few over 800 men at Cowpens, historian Lawrence Babits, in his detailed study of the Battle, estimates the real numbers as:
A battalion of Continental infantry under Lt-Col John Eager Howard, with one company from Delaware, one from Virginia and three from Maryland; each with a strength of sixty men (300)
A company of Virginia State troops under Captain John Lawson (75)
A company of South Carolina State troops under Captain Joseph Pickens (60)
A small company of North Carolina State troops under Captain Henry Connelly (number not given)
A Virginia Militia battalion under Frank Triplett (160)
Two companies of Virginia Militia under Major David Campbell (50)
A battalion of North Carolina Militia under Colonel Joseph McDowell (260-285)
A brigade of four battalions of South Carolina Militia under Colonel Andrew Pickens, comprising a three-company battalion of the Spartanburg Regiment under Lt-Col Benjamin Roebuck; a four-company battalion of the Spartanburg Regiment under Col John Thomas; five companies of the Little River Regiment under Lt-Col Joseph Hayes and seven companies of the Fair Forest Regiment under Col Thomas Brandon. Babits states that these battalion "ranged in size from 120 to more than 250 men". If Roebuck's three companies numbered 120 and Brandon's seven companies numbered 250, then Thomas's four companies probably numbered about 160 and Hayes's five companies about 200, for a total of (730)
Three small companies of Georgia Militia commander by Major Cunningham [ who numbered (55)
Detachments of the 1st and 3rd Continental Light Dragoon (both recruited mainly in Virginia) under Lt-Col William Washington (82) Detachments of State Dragoons from North Carolina and Virginia (30) A detachment of South Carolina State Dragoons, with a few mounted Georgians, commanded by Major James McCall (25) A company of newly-raised volunteers from the local South Carolina Militia commanded by Major Benjamin Jolly (45)
The figures given by Laurence E. Babits total 82 Continental Light Dragoons; 55 State Dragoons; 45 Militia Dragoons; 300 Continental infantry; about 150 State infantry and 1,255-1,280 Militia infantry, for a total of 1,887-1,912 officers and men.
Broken down by state, there were about 855 South Carolinians; 442 Virginians; 290-315 North Carolinians; 180 Marylanders; 60 Georgians and 60 Delawareans.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 6:52pm
I gladly concede that point.
wanna take a crack at my points?
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 6:54pm
No New Englanders at Cowpens, Emile. There were at Yorktown, though. I doubt very many of them were fighting for "mercantile issues".
I gotta go catch a plane. Thanks for the chat.
Posted by Balrog at 06/12/2008 @ 6:55pm
It's an issue of liberty vs. saftey and what you value more. Of course imposing on peoples' liberties makes local and gonvernment law agencies more effective. The question for the individual is whether you are willing to sacrifice a lot of freedom for a little saftey.
Our troops are sacrifincing A LOT of their safety to protect our liberties. I think you and I could sacrifice a little of our saftey in order to maintain our librties....and I think most Americans are willing to do that.
Posted by danconstan at 06/12/2008 @ 7:10pm
No New Englanders at Cowpens, Emile. There were at Yorktown, though. I doubt very many of them were fighting for "mercantile issues".
it was not the militia men who made the decision to go to war. it was politicians, then as now.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 7:11pm
the British sought to quell the unrest in the colonies. they sent troops. those troops were occupying the country.
does bring to mind another occupation.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 7:23pm
So the neo-cons might consider foreign flagged vessels sailing from American ports as torture repositories. This would give the white linen suited stooges of the empire a new bailiwick owing to our unpopularity in many places around the world. Oh wait, I forgot about Bechtel. The infrastructure has its claims.
Posted by Sorelish at 06/12/2008 @ 7:50pm
the damn thing, the constitution, was a lie for most of its existence.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008
Kind of like Socialist - Zionists with regard to the Palestinian issue wouldn't you say?
Posted by OneVote at 06/12/2008 @ 7:55pm
lvliberty1
not so. there are subsequent treaties that are concerned with children.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 8:05pm
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
I'm sure you're the "single bullet in the back of the head" kind of guy. And in a packed sports stadium.
Posted by Sorelish at 06/12/2008 @ 8:09pm
Interesting idea: We send our army to foreign lands to fight those who have attacked us. We don't let our troups kill the enemy if they surrender. We then hold them as prisoners while we continue to fight the war. Since we don't have evidence to try them in a civilian court of law, we release them. They go home and attack us again while liberals lecture us on the Constitutional rights of foreign terrorists.
Just wondering: Is this what the left had in mind when they told us that war didn't make sense?
Posted by Dimslie at 06/12/2008 @ 8:20pm
Let's put the liberal lawyers on the front lines for 9 months and then let them have another go at explaining their objections to how we treat terrorists.
Posted by Dimslie at 06/12/2008 @ 8:27pm
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Why is it today's tyrannical despots usually are standing over immense oil deposits?
Posted by Sorelish at 06/12/2008 @ 8:30pm
*Now let's look at what a total crock of shit it is to ignorantly cite this quotation in a discussion over whether or not enemy combatants deserve constitutional protections. Let's see, these guys have sworn to facilitate the destruction of the United States government and they have been caught on the battle field baring arms against her. What Freedoms did these people relinquish in order to obtain the constitutional right to Habeus corpuse?*
You realize you found the flaw in your own argument right? If they cannot challenge that they indeed WERE on the battlefield taking arms against the US (or any other part of your arguments) or assert any rights period, how can they possibly expect any other part of the process to be fair? Habeas corpus goes way way way back, and its primary purpose was to establish the primacy of law. If you argue that they are not subject to the rights of habeas corpus, then what rights DO they have? What laws are they subject to? The ones King George decides they are? How is that not an abject abuse of authority?
Posted by yutsano at 06/12/2008 @ 8:32pm
Did the "unrest" the British sought to quell include the murder of 800,000 citizens by a tyranical despot?
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
No but it did involve the wasting of some fine tea.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 8:37pm
Just a few points... 1. The Rule of Law: A SCOTUS decision in 1950 (Johnson v. Eisentrager)concluded that nonresident alien combatants had no right to habeaus corpus, hence the Bush Admin was operating well within the law. This court tortured the common understanding of this precident to come to today's ruling.
2. The details of today's decision show that it very narrowly applies to gitmo: if these jihadists were held in Iraq/Afganistan where they were captured, this ruling would not apply. This court discerned a differnece between military occupation of teritory in Iraq and our military occupation of gitmo (Castro refuses to accept our offer of rent). How the Left translates this imperceptable difference into a Neocon disregard for the constitution is beyond me
3. Cccomfo1 wrote: "Holding a detainee indefinitely does nothing". Considering that at least 30 men released from Gitmo have been killed or recaptured while fighting American/allied troops, holding them indefinitely protects our troops from their savagery. Ask any Soldier or Marine whether that's nothing...
Posted by JO3 at 06/12/2008 @ 8:40pm
Why is it today's tyrannical despots usually are standing over immense oil deposits?
Posted by Sorelish at 06/12/2008 | ignore this person | warn this person
What is stranger is why so many are former "allies" of the United States.
Posted by OneVote at 06/12/2008 @ 8:40pm
#
sacrifice? sacred? you guys are making a religion out of it. a very poor idea.
the revolutionary war was not about ideals, it was about mercantile issues.
it was not about freedom and it was not about democracy. it was about money.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 | ignore this person | warn this person
That is so not true. First, you ignore the power of the so-called King's Party. Lord North was very much the creature of George III. Indeed, the King still had enough power to be able to appoint Prime Ministers without having a majority in Commons behind them.
Further, there were enough offices and sinecures within the royal gift to buy political support as necessary. George III didn't always have things his way, but he was a powerful political player.
Regarding the colonial motivation. The problem wasn't just with the taxes, etc., but that they had no control over the decision-making. There was also the fear that their republican institutions would eventually fall further and further under British sway.
Posted by brunowe at 06/12/2008 @ 8:42pm
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
Problem is Mary that it has been admitted that most of the people being detained are guilty of no crimes. They were not found on a battlefield many of them were taken from their homes at night. You like to think that every detainee was arrested legitimately after a battle. If they actually WERE firing at American troops then they do have the evidence to try them. If they don't have the evidence to try them it is probably because they were not captured on a battlefield firing at American troops but instead was dragged out of a building with little to no evidence beyond simple suspicion tying him to whatever he is accused of.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 8:43pm
What rights do they have? The right to be treated fairly and humanly while in detention. The right to a fair trial conducted by a military tribunal. The right of appeal subsequent to a conviction by that tribunal. The right of access by the Red Cross or Red Crescent Society. The right to receive mail. The right to wages if forced into labor while in detainment. The right to adequate health care, shelter, and food. The right to practice their religious faith.
But they do not have a right to Habeas under Geneva.
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
Does that include the right to be held for an indeterminate amount of time and not be tried? Like the fellow I told you about earlier. Or how about torture like the story told in the evil, of a man having his genitals slashed? Face it if you advocate water torture then you have no business quoting the Geneva Convention.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/12/2008 @ 8:49pm
So it would be fair to say then that you are against the Geneva Convention?
The decision is ultimately not about their rights but about Constitutional limitations on the power of Congress and the executive.
First, the applicability of the habeas writ doesn't stem from the Geneva Convention but from the Anglo-American history of using the habeas writ as a guard against unlawful detention. Holding that the writ applies doesn't contravene the Geneva convention.
Since the writ applies, Congress can only suspend it under certain circumstances, circumstances that haven't been met.
Posted by brunowe at 06/12/2008 @ 8:50pm
In 2002, the United States signed the Optional Protocol on children in armed ...
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 8:52pm
1. The Rule of Law: A SCOTUS decision in 1950 (Johnson v. Eisentrager)concluded that nonresident alien combatants had no right to habeaus corpus,
No it didn't. The difficulties in brining Eisentrager et al. within the power of the US courts was part of that decision. So was the fact that the occupation of Germany was under an Allied, and not a US, mandate. Further,the fact that the occupation aimed at ultimately restoring German sovereignty was a factor in not applying US law. None of those factors are involved in Gitmo.
2.This court discerned a differnece between military occupation of teritory in Iraq and our military occupation of gitmo (Castro refuses to accept our offer of rent). How the Left translates this imperceptable difference into a Neocon disregard for the constitution is beyond me
It isn't an imperceptible difference. We have had exclusive control over Gitmo for over a century. We don't recognize any Cuban authority, except nominally. The governments of Afghanistan and Iraq have a little more say in what is done there.
3. Your presupposing that they weren't motivated to after US troops by being rounded up and placed in Gitmo in the first place. Since no proper procedure was done to see if they were enemies, we'll never know. Therefore, by your logic, even people known to be innocent need to be held indefinitely because they may, upon release, decide to take revenge on US troops.
Posted by brunowe at 06/12/2008 @ 8:56pm
Posted by brunowe
the long negotiations to avoid the conflict were carried on with parliament. not the king
the problem for England was that no one in parliament was really in charge of the colonies. the responsibilities kept shifting.
it was all about money. it was never about freedom and democracy.
how do I know this? the win did not bring freedom and democracy to anyone who did not have it before. that is why it was not a revolution. it brought economic freedom to the colonies.
and the constitution was a complete lie for over 200 years. it promised things it did not even attempt to deliver. human rights.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 9:01pm
Emile, can you accede to the fact that America evolved into something greater than its beginnings?
Posted by yutsano at 06/12/2008 @ 9:07pm
yes, I can. it is however an imperfect vessel. when a pres leads the country into war based on lies, and congress fails to stop him, or even hold him accountable for his failures, then the constitution falls short in the practical sense.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 9:11pm
the constitution clearly states that congress has the sole responsibility of the treatment of prisoners.
Bush's actions in this matter have ALL been unconstitutional.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 9:13pm
the long negotiations to avoid the conflict were carried on with parliament. not the king
That doesn't change the fact that the King could exercise control over policy.
it was never about freedom and democracy.
That isn't true either. The political class was free from British control. Further, the idea of a large federal republic, separation of powers and a constitution as a basic law superior to legislation were revolutionary practices.
Posted by brunowe at 06/12/2008 @ 9:15pm
No...what we are witnessing is the disintegration of our republic in the name of marxist/socialist, global government, anti G-d, ant-freedom ideology.
Posted by lvliberty1
blibber blabber.
none of this is even remotely true.
plus, ants deserve to be free.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/12/2008 @ 9:17pm
Okay so you're arguing is in the application of the Constitution as opposed to the document itself. In that case yes I agree the treasonous cowards who are running the government have failed it miserably. But if you think that in 230+ years we've only modified it 26 times and the vast majority of the modifications have expanded civil rights, then it hasn't done too shabby.
Posted by yutsano at 06/12/2008 @ 9:20pm
Ok let me get this right, in the liberal thought process the constitution protects terrorist who attack US troops and conspire to kill US citizens but Habeus can be suspended if U.S. citizens take up rebellion against the US government ?
Ok I see now how the liberal thought process works, interesting
Posted by blazer6768 at 06/12/2008 @ 9:33pm
brunowe, I'm limiting this to just my responses since both of us write too much :)
1. Iraq and Afganistan are both allied operations intending to return control to native governments. Where is the difference?
2. We have attempted to maintain the lease agreement with Cuba even though we dont recognize the Castro regime, Castro simply refuses to cash the checks we send him or to renegotiate the treaty, ergo forfeiting any say in how we use the land. Do we excercise any less control over our bases in Iraq than we do gitmo?
3. I understand the logic of this argument, but PLEASE.... you really don't believe this? I don't think you mean any of the following but I can't accept this line of argument becasue:
a. The reason they were released is because we thought they were innocent: isn't it a more reasonable conclusion that our intel can't tell the difference between good muslims and bad muslims? Therefore imprisoning them indefinitely (or at least until our intel gets a clue about the jihad idelology) is the only way we can be sure we are protecting American lives. b . This implies that people want to kill us because we deserve it. They were merely nice normal shepards until the evil Americans turned them into jihadists... Way too close to "Blame America First" for my comfort. c. I trust the Soldiers and Marines on the ground to have enough sense to know who is shooting at them. I do not think that they are universally ugly brutes who run around grabbing anyone they can catch and sending them to gitmo. The simple fact that gitmo is not filled to the brim with POWs shows how careful we are about who gets detained.
Posted by JO3 at 06/12/2008 @ 9:36pm
brunowe
you're grasping.
freedom and democracy were not the casus belli. economic issues were.
the negotiations and the conflict was with parliament. christ a previous parliament had the goddamn king executed.
you came late to this discussion. my point was that the beef was more with parliament.
we had parliaments, they had a parliament.
it would be polite to address my points, in addition to bringing forth your own. certainly the king had great influence. he had that influence IN PARLIAMENT.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 9:43pm
as I pointed out before, the constitution came much later, and it was certainly not a factor in the civil war/"revolution"
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 9:45pm
jo3
The difference is that we at least are affording Afghanistan and Iraq some leeway in running their own country. US control isn't absolute. It is in Gitmo. If we were to establish permanent bases in Iraq where total extraterritoriality applied (in short, no Iraqi laws applicable) and used them as detention centers, then habeas could apply there as well. The SCOTUS opinion really rests on a pragmatic argument of the extent to which US law in a given geographic area excludes the law of the country that is the ostensible sovereign.
It's very possible that our intel can't make those distinctions--all the more reason for a proper judicial process. Further, it's certainly possible that we mistakenly released bad people, but we can never know without a proper judicial process. Many of the Gitmo detainees weren't caught in active hostilities, many were fingered by other natives for reasons that may or may not have been in good faith.
I don't think they are universally ugly brutes, but counter-insurgency warfare does have a brutalizing effect. It isn't hard to picture situations where soldiers may conclude, on insufficient evidence, that the person they grabbed was the person who pushed the button that set off an IED.
Posted by brunowe at 06/12/2008 @ 9:47pm
Iraq and Afganistan are both allied operations intending to return control to native governments.
complete nonsense. in both cases the gov't displaced by the American invasion was a native gov't. the warlords aren't more afghani than the Taleban. the same goes for the Baath party. they're ALL Iraqis.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 9:48pm
The colonials had a dispute with the British government, in which power was exercised by both King and Parliament. The royal prerogative still counted for something. Further, you can hardly compare the situation of Charles I to George III. One was a king who tried to rule without Parliament, the other was one who endeavored, with intermittent success, to use it. That doesn't change the fact that, when he succeeded, the power was his. It was, after all, he who put Lord North in power and kept him there.
Second, if the colonial political class has their assemblies overruled by Parliamentary enactments or the ukase of British-appointed colonial governments, then freedom and democracy certainly are issues.
Posted by brunowe at 06/12/2008 @ 9:51pm
But if you think that in 230+ years we've only modified it 26 times and the vast majority of the modifications have expanded civil rights, then it hasn't done too shabby.
Posted by yutsano
ask the slaves and ask the indians. ask women. the constitution did not protect them, not in practice, not in intent.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 9:51pm
Second, if the colonial political class has their assemblies overruled by Parliamentary enactments or the ukase of British-appointed colonial governments, then freedom and democracy certainly are issues.
Posted by brunowe
what you are describing is independence, not freedom and democracy. they were not involved.
the people who were unfree, remained unfree. same with democracy. the war did not bring greater democracy.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 9:54pm
The simple fact that gitmo is not filled to the brim with POWs shows how careful we are about who gets detained.
Posted by JO3
this is nonsense too, and circular reasoning. and divorced from fact.
we have numerous prisons in Iraq. and secret prisons all over the world.
it's just not that kind of war, with set battles etc. in WW2 at the end of a great battle 100,000 and more prisoners were taken. no comparison between then and now is possible.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/12/2008 @ 9:58pm
The simple fact that gitmo is not filled to the brim with POWs shows how careful we are about who gets detained.
Posted by JO3
and the fact that your prisons are stuffed full shows you don't.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/12/2008 @ 10:02pm
emile duBois wrote: complete nonsense. in both cases the gov't displaced by the American invasion was a native gov't. the warlords aren't more afghani than the Taleban. the same goes for the Baath party. they're ALL Iraqis.
Indeed, and the nazis were just as German as those who replaced them...what's your point? If the standard is allied occupation followed by a return to native control, today's situation mirrors that of WWII.
Posted by JO3 at 06/12/2008 @ 10:09pm
frosty zoom wrote:
and the fact that your prisons are stuffed full shows you don't.
Or it could show that we've lost the common sense to execute those that pose a danger to society.
Posted by JO3 at 06/12/2008 @ 10:14pm
We are all guilty of suspending the rights of "those people". I remember when they beheaded Daniel Pearl,I clearly remember wanting to break out the nukes. Steinbeck was correct greed and gluttony left alone to grow will destroy us. Our petty natures are still very strong
Posted by julien38 at 06/12/2008 @ 10:19pm
Or it could show that we've lost the common sense to execute those that pose a danger to society.
Posted by JO3
kill the crackheads?
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/12/2008 @ 10:21pm
emile duBois:
1st, please stop calling others opinions nonsense, it's rude and doesnt lead to an open & friendly discussion.
It is not curcular reasoning: I am not positing that they are guilty because they are in prison, I am arguing that we have the power and potential to grab anyone we wish, or even commit wholesale genocide if it occured to us. The fact that we haven't shows that we being very circumspect about who we detain.
While we do have some prisons in Iraq, the fact that the Iraqi public is now overwhelmingly helpful if not supportive of our efforts shows that we haven't been grabbing folks willy nilly; the poulation of Iraq just isnt that large, if we detained too many people without good reason there would be open and uncontrollable revolt.
Think about it from the perspective of the soldier on the ground: they do not want to waste their time, rations etc. "babysitting" detainees who they don't reasonably believe to be dangerous.
As for secret prisons, we dont really know anything about them, hence the secret. Using this lack of evidence to argue that something fishy is going on IS circular reasoning.
it's just not that kind of war, with set battles etc. in WW2 at the end of a great battle 100,000 and more prisoners were taken. no comparison between then and now is possible.
So which is it: a new kind of war requiring unique approaches ie. gitmo, or something that we can approach with traditional legal procedures that havent even worked to control crminality in our own conutry?
Posted by JO3 at 06/12/2008 @ 10:35pm
While we do have some prisons in Iraq, the fact that the Iraqi public is now overwhelmingly helpful if not supportive of our efforts shows that we haven't been grabbing folks willy nilly; the poulation of Iraq just isnt that large, if we detained too many people without good reason there would be open and uncontrollable revolt.
Posted by JO3
nonsense.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/12/2008 @ 10:37pm
or something that we can approach with traditional legal procedures that havent even worked to control crminality in our own conutry?
Posted by JO3
why don't you fix your own country first?
ever been to flint?
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/12/2008 @ 10:38pm
kill the crackheads? Posted by frosty zoom
let me suprise you frosty: sure. Not in every case, but in a great many more than we do now.
Posted by JO3 at 06/12/2008 @ 10:40pm
Liberal elites, get over yourselves. Your over analyzing postings are real eye rollers. This decision has nothing to do with legal thinking - if it had - 200 years of history would have prevailed. This decision was nothing more than judges voicing there personal opinions. If you really think Ruth Ginsberg is a rational legal mind you have to be kidding yourself. I can guarantee you the outcome of every vote she will cast as a member of the court. The good news about this decision, it will mobilize the red states. Yep, my Missouri fellows aren't going to like this. Terrorists for Obama! By the way, if you think some farmer from central USA cares if a foreign muslim has "habeas corpus" rights, you are mistaken. They don't wan't terrorists to have any rights. This will help McCain!
Posted by graesan at 06/12/2008 @ 10:45pm
why don't you fix your own country first?
ever been to flint?
Posted by frosty zoom
Love to, but we've gotta make sure we survive long enough to fix.
Besides, I thought one of the problems was that Americans didn't think globally?
If you mean Michigan, yes and it sucked, but that was many years ago.
Posted by JO3 at 06/12/2008 @ 10:47pm
alas...
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/12/2008 @ 11:03pm
I'm in a deconstructing mood.
*Liberal elites, get over yourselves. Your over analyzing postings are real eye rollers.*
Liberal elites is such an old libel. Get creative at least. Plus, well, it ain't true.
*This decision has nothing to do with legal thinking - if it had - 200 years of history would have prevailed. This decision was nothing more than judges voicing there personal opinions.*
If you actually read Scalia's opinion, you're right. It doesn't contain much rational legal opinion and is a simple neocon rant.
*If you really think Ruth Ginsberg is a rational legal mind you have to be kidding yourself. I can guarantee you the outcome of every vote she will cast as a member of the court.*
So you're psychic now?
Seriously, Ruth Bader Ginsburg is a long respected jurist with a long body of legal opinion behind her. To say that she does not possess a rational legal mind is just you trying to be a neocon bully.
*The good news about this decision, it will mobilize the red states. Yep, my Missouri fellows aren't going to like this. Terrorists for Obama! By the way, if you think some farmer from central USA cares if a foreign muslim has "habeas corpus" rights, you are mistaken. They don't wan't terrorists to have any rights. This will help McCain!*
If your Missouri fellows pay attention enough to figure out exactly what the SCOTUS actually said, you might be shocked. I agree that this will help, but not in the way you think. This will mobilize the liberal base by heightening the importance of appointing jurists to the SC. And the thought that Roe v Wade is one vote away from overturn is a very scary thought to many women. Anything that brings attention to that fact can only help Obama.
Now go away, the adults are playing now.
Posted by yutsano at 06/12/2008 @ 11:50pm
Or it could show that we've lost the common sense to execute those that pose a danger to society.
Posted by JO3
another member of the grrr, kill, kill club
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 12:03am
or even commit wholesale genocide if it occured to us.
arent' we nice. complete nonsense and worse.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 12:05am
JO3
you are nothing but a hater. and you disgust me.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 12:06am
Further, the idea of a large federal republic, separation of powers and a constitution as a basic law superior to legislation were revolutionary practices.
Posted by brunowe
you're putting the cart before the horse. all these came about much later. they were not a factor in the war.
the casus belli was of an economic nature, ie the Stamp Act.
the irony is of course that the American colonists had one of the smallest tax burden in the empire.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 12:14am
I am enjoying reading the remarks of people who putatively give a damn about this country and yet are willing to toss out the foundation of any free society, habeas corpus. It's not mentioned in the Constitution and the Geneva Conventions because it is understood as the foundation of freedom, that you can't just toss people in jail never to be heard from again until some authority deems it so.
If you care about these things that make this country great, such as a bedrock of habeas corpus, among other inalienable rights of humans, then you have to grant them to everybody, not just those you like. When you draw those lines you are what if memory serves Jesus called a hyprocrite.
Posted by onthehelm at 06/13/2008 @ 12:18am
I always enjoy posting with you Bruno.
a historian is good not only because of the facts at his/her command, but for the conclusions and connections he/she draws from those facts.
I include us both.
I'm reading a little von Ranke and Michelet, who despite their 19th century publication dates are fresh today still.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 12:18am
Brilliant! Bestow Constitutional rights on enemy combatants (prisoners of war) that have never set foot on American soil. Let's pay for their lawyers and trials. We are good and kind people.
This nation continues to destroy itself from within. We deserve Obama and the acceleration of our race down this path of supreme idiocy that he will bring.
Posted by jimmyb61 at 06/13/2008 @ 12:24am
Our justice system is the best in the world. How can you consider yourself a patriotic citizen of the United States of America and not believe that the same justice system that we allow the disgusting pedophiles and serial murderers or our nation to be tried by is somehow not good enough for the alleged terrorists? I think not. This nation is the best system in the world and those who do not believe that are traitors--period. Believe in the Constitution and the enlightened vision of our forefathers. If it is good enough for our citizens it is good enough for the world. The real issue is Bush's ability to continue his deception and his house of cards is falling down. Impeach, impeach, impeach--if not only to neuter his Iran war hopes. Stop this mad-man.
Posted by PrairieDeb at 06/13/2008 @ 12:39am
"Brilliant! Bestow Constitutional rights on enemy combatants (prisoners of war) that have never set foot on American soil. Let's pay for their lawyers and trials. We are good and kind people."
America certainly set foot on them, and soiled them too. Though, isn't Gitmo technically American soil? Even if we accept that these "enemy combatants" never did set foot on American soil, wouldn't you still want to know what they actually did and have justice served? Apparently you'd rather people, because they're foreigners and not Americans, sit and rot in cells and never get a day in court.
If all you fascist fuckheads are so sure these Gitmo detainees are guilty, what are you so fucking scared of in giving them a trial?
"This nation continues to destroy itself from within. We deserve Obama and the acceleration of our race down this path of supreme idiocy that he will bring."
Blah, blah, blah. You'll still have Rush Limbaugh beginning in 09! HAHAHAHAHAHA!
Posted by MATTMAN at 06/13/2008 @ 01:33am
Posts like these - "I do not believe the general public will like this ruling. It will be spun against the Dems one way or the other, accurate or not." ... we have ample evidence that the general public is ... how shall I say? ... um, dumbed-down. Bad enough that the general public does not to a large extent know what the Constitution says, or why it makes our country different than all others, at least in what it attempts to be. But it has been so much worse to have a President monkey that doesn't know why the Constitution is to be enforced whether it happpens to be convenient at the current time or not. One of the very good things about a President Obama will be his background in Constitutional law - and his reverence for our Constitution. You poor people just don't get it. If we do things like Bush has been trying to do, we become no different than the people and the rulers of the countries we are currently at odds with.
Posted by betsyz at 06/13/2008 @ 06:47am
When I served in the military there were times I was confronted with an unlawful order. The only time I was permitted to act as an individual was the way I processed that order. Those of us that have good moral compasses always chose to do the right thing.
The ruling by the Supreme Court to ignore the unlawful order of the Justice Department vis-ΰ-vis the Whitehouse indicates that there are at least five dedicated patriotic Americans on the court.
Posted by USMC_NamVet at 06/13/2008 @ 07:29am
The protocol does not have any affect on our ability to detain enemy combatants regardless of age. Also, in accordance with the protocol, we have complied with it's provision to reintegrate juvenile combatants back into their countries.
these two sentences are contradictory.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 07:55am
Isn't amazing that a guy like Anthony Kennedy, a RONALD REAGAN appointee, is now supposedly a "wild-eyed, terrorist-loving left-wing radical"!?!?!?!?
Posted by Mask at 06/13/2008 @ 09:25am
Posted by USMC_NamVet at 06/13/2008
Another leftist liberal elitist - right MBB and LVL?
Posted by Turk33 at 06/13/2008 @ 09:36am
What is abundantly clear is that Bush and everybody in his administration reasonably believed Gitmo was covered by Eisentrager. If they didn't, they never would have brought them there.
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/13/2008
Just like Bushco "thought" there were WMD in Iraq? It really would behoove this country to have an executive branch that took more care before stepping knee deep in quagmires of every shape and size.
Ignorant, imperialistic or impuslive - any way you look at it Bush has been a disaaster for this country.
Posted by Turk33 at 06/13/2008 @ 09:41am
I wouldn't call him an elitist either. The GOP just needs something to label him with. If you think that's outrageous..you should check out the stuff they have on Obama at http://www.realdealreport.com
Posted by cory714 at 06/13/2008 @ 09:55am
Liv, You are straddling the fence with your Geneva convention talk. The U.S. defined the detaines as Enemy Combatants, not POW's so they could say that they didn't fall under the rules of the Geneva Convention. Then, W and Company said that since they were enemey combatants, they detaines also didn't fall under U.S. law since they aren't American citizens.
What they did was create a gray zone where they thought they could do pretty much whatever the hell they felt like doing. Do you really want to give anyone in the government that kind of unchecked power?!
Say in 20 years time this country goes through some sort of major social change and the majority of the population embraces socialistic attitudes and decides that they wish to punish those who stand in their way by declaring them enemy combatants, locking them up, torturing them to get them to rat out their buddies and so on. These detaines could spend years in jail without a trial, but because some jackass declared them enemy combatants, their citizenship didn't matter nor did their rights.
This is pretty much what you are backing. I don't like people who blow innocent people up any more than you, but I also don't like seeing my country turn into a militaristic nation state which is what W and the boys have been trying to do. Is the U.S. going to be a country that of laws where all are protected equally under the law, or a jungle state, where the wealthy and well connected trample the shit out of everyone else' rights.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/13/2008 @ 10:07am
I wouldn't call him an elitist.
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/13/2008
What "America hating leftist?"
A "Dangerous ideologue committed to the downfall of our Constitutional Republic?"
"A traitor?"
A member of the "anti-war left?"
These are all your terms - do they apply to USMC_NamVet?
Posted by Turk33 at 06/13/2008 @ 10:09am
Sorry - What "America about America hating leftist?"
Posted by Turk33 at 06/13/2008 @ 10:10am
My fingers or eyes apparently don't work this morning.
It should have said (both times): What about "America hating leftist?"
I really do miss the preview feature.
Posted by Turk33 at 06/13/2008 @ 10:14am
Here's a couple quotes from another article posted here at the nation that sum up our brave right wing folks posting here.
"As Washington warned, it is extremely difficult to unmask "pretended patriotism" when the nation is frightened by enemies real and imagined. But Washington could not have anticipated the sort of mass media society in which government propaganda becomes compelling and inconvenient truths are concealed behind the veil of national security."
Another one was Jefferson warning of foreign entanglements jeapordizing the United States.
Both men must have had a crystal ball as did Dwight Eisenhower because they hit the nail on the head on how this nation has turned out. It's in bed with Israel, entangled to the nth degree, intruding on other nation's soverign business and making a mockery of democracy at home.
As Washington pointed out, these false patriots will scare the masses with enemies real and imagined.
The right wing folks posting here in general are a bunch of cowards that are afraid of their own shadows, but talk the tough talk. They are really brave with our soldier's lives and the lives of people on foreign soil that they don't know. They are so afraid that someone is coming to get them that they will start wars on falsified information, defend the fact that they did start a war on falsified information, let people continue to die and meanwhile wrap themselves in flags and quote the bible. Go figure.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/13/2008 @ 10:37am
Hi Balrog,
I appreciated your comback to Emile when he (while responding to you) automatically thought of New Englanders fighting during the Revolutionary War, even during fighting in the South.
I was born, raised and live now in the North - but I have also lived in Virgina and so there is a little bit of Virginian in me.
And I have heard here at home, during a conversation (one I overheard but was not part of), people discussing the need to obtain something from Virginia, but doing so with a mock Southern accent.
If they had needed information from Indiana or Montana or New Mexico perhaps they would have just been talking in their normal voice, but it was from Virginia so they went with the mock accent.
It ticked me off. I did not like these Northern Yankee snobs acting like jerks. Unfortunately, I did not have the opportunity at the time to tell them what I thought.
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008 @ 10:59am
Hello everbody,
Also, I of course do not agree with what the Supreme Court did.
It is a great victory for liberalism and for the terrorists.
But everything that can be said has already been said, and things I would say have already been pointed out by bloggers such as lvliberty1.
So now the only thing I can do is relax, and wait for the day when I can be killed in the terrorist attack that will probably happen because some of the terrorists are able to go free (and thus free to go back and try to kill us) because now they have their "rights".
The thing that would happen after that is that Jimmy Carter would then make his tour to apologize to anybody he feels we made angry and thus left them to have no choice but attack us. Fortunately, I will be dead and won't see Mr. Carter's remarks - because it would turn my stomach if I did.
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008 @ 11:06am
So the claims that Bush suspended Habeus is complete bullshit.
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/13/2008
5 members of the Supreme Court do not agree.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/13/2008 @ 11:28am
"So now the only thing I can do is relax, and wait for the day when I can be killed in the terrorist attack that will probably happen because some of the terrorists are able to go free (and thus free to go back and try to kill us) because now they have their "rights"."
this is nonsense. we have released numerous detainees already.
you are unaware that the practically the entire world recognizes HUMAN RIGHTS. the supremes did not give the detainees any rights. they recognized the fact that they had them already.
the Geneva conventions recognize a detainee's, whether uniformed soldier or not, right to have his/her status decided by a judge.
many people were picked up by mistake. there is no battle field in this war of occupation, it takes place in civilian neighborhoods. they have a right to have their status adjucated.
now get me right, I do not write these things for your benefit. you are too dumb and brainwashed to understand them. I write for all the other readers.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 11:29am
now get me right, I do not write these things for your benefit. you are too dumb and brainwashed to understand them. I write for all the other readers.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008
Classic and to the point JR!! Loved it.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/13/2008 @ 11:37am
5 members of the Supreme Court do not agree.
Posted by Hman23 at 06/13/2008
The 4 that didn't agree is what has got me worried...along with a compliant Congress in cahoots with the Supreme Commander.
Bush now promises he will abide but will consider "legislation," an obvious attempt at an end around (again) and attempt to put this issue before the court again in new clothes. Let us hope that he will not have a lockstep Congress this time around. With an approval rating in the twenties now, Congress ought to realize that they are on the wrong side of this issue. Hopefully, this is the just the posturing of a lame duck, but our new Attorney General (what a mistake) looks like he is on board.
Posted by OneVote at 06/13/2008 @ 11:45am
3. I am on record here as opposing waterboarding (though I did go through it in my military training).
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/13/2008
Can you show me proof that it is a complete fabrication Father Death?
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 11:52am
Hopefully, this is the just the posturing of a lame duck, but our new Attorney General (what a mistake) looks like he is on board.
Posted by OneVote at 06/13/2008
The dems have control of the house of representatives and could stop the bill cold. If the dems want to save face, no is the time to do it and tell Bushco what they can do with their challenges against the laws. Bush acts like a spoiled little brat, if he doesn't get what he wants, he figures he can just change the rules so he can get what he wants. By and large he's gotten away with it, but this time, if he does, some dems feet should be held to the fire. Pelosi's first.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/13/2008 @ 11:54am
So now the only thing I can do is relax, and wait for the day when I can be killed in the terrorist attack that will probably happen because some of the terrorists are able to go free (and thus free to go back and try to kill us) because now they have their "rights".
The thing that would happen after that is that Jimmy Carter would then make his tour to apologize to anybody he feels we made angry and thus left them to have no choice but attack us. Fortunately, I will be dead and won't see Mr. Carter's remarks - because it would turn my stomach if I did.
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/200
I would be more concerned about people like LVL who say that 38% of the US population should be executed. including everyone on this blog that doesn't agree with him.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 11:58am
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008
And actually no SJ. The terrorists wouldn't go free. They would be prosecuted and then held. The innocent people would be the ones to go free. These facts a little old but this is from Professor Mark Denbeaux and attorney Joshua Denbeaux, counsel to two of the detainees at Guantanamo in 2006.
"1. Fifty-five percent (55%) of the detainees are not determined to have committed any hostile acts against the United States or its coalition allies. 2. Only 8% of the detainees were characterized as al Qaeda fighters. Of the remaining detainees, 40% have no definitive connection with al Qaeda at all and 18% are have no definitive affiliation with either al Qaeda or the Taliban.
3. The Government has detained numerous persons based on mere affiliations with a large number of groups that in fact, are not on the Department of Homeland Security terrorist watchlist. Moreover, the nexus between such a detainee and such organizations varies considerably. Eight percent are detained because they are deemed "fighters for;" 30% considered "members of;" a large majority - 60% -- are detained merely because they are "associated with" a group or groups the Government asserts are terrorist organizations. For 2% of the prisoners their nexus to any terrorist group is unidentified.
4. Only 5% of the detainees were captured by United States forces. 86% of the detainees were arrested by either Pakistan or the Northern Alliance and turned over to United States custody. This 86% of the detainees captured by Pakistan or the Northern Alliance were handed over to the United States at a time in which the United States offered large bounties for capture of suspected enemies.
5. Finally, the population of persons deemed not to be enemy combatants - mostly Uighers - are in fact accused of more serious allegations than a great many persons still deemed to be enemy combatants."
55% of them have absolutely zero evidence saying they committed a hostile act toward the US. So if they have no evidence against 55% of the people being held there then why the hell are they still holding them? I know you would be screaming bloody murder if someone from the US was held as a prisoner in another country.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 12:07pm
By and large he's gotten away with it, but this time, if he does, some dems feet should be held to the fire. Pelosi's first.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/13/2008
Dems lied to us in 2006 and they will undoubtedly do it again. Only thing that gets them motivated is the possibility of loss of their Congressional seats. Based on their performance to date, I think the only reason that they may keep their seats is the repugnant Repub alternative. I haven't seen any polls supporting a huge increase in Congressional approval rating since the Dems took the majority. All we get from the Dems is "just wait till we have the executive branch."
Posted by OneVote at 06/13/2008 @ 12:18pm
Hurray for the Constitution! Here's an old, but good, quote from a (very) old novel: "We're fighting for survival. That's true... isn't it? ...Survival as what?...It isn't enough to survive. We have to survive as SOMETHING! The country isn't a rock...and it isn't an extension of one's self. It's what it stands for. It's what it stands for when STANDING for SOMETHING...is the most difficult." I wonder how many modern "patriotic" US citizens, in another time and another place, would happily take jobs as concentration camp guards? Do they even know what America is all about?
Posted by Hamiltonian at 06/13/2008 @ 12:20pm
Read the actual story and you find that:
1. There is no corroboration of his story
2. He provides a number of conflicting statements that are material
3. The govt has provided documented evidence of his lies
And finally you have the fact that Al Qaeda trains all insurgents in good Muslim fashion to lie to your enemies.
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/13/2008
There is nothing conflicting about it Father Death unless there is a link I am missing. All he says is my genitals were slashed and some people took pictures of them. That's all the article says. I would like to see the pictures but I have a feeling if they exist the government will never let them get out. Please give me a link to the evidence of his lies.
But as it stands there are no conflicting statements in the article.
"Reprieve said Mohamed's account was confirmed by an unidentified journalist it says spoke with a U.S. intelligence agent who saw the photographs."
This isn't Mohammed's lie this is Reprieves statement. So if the journalist who saw them comes out then it will be corroborated by someone who is willing to give his name. However if the person does exist I doubt he would come out because of fear for his life.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 12:22pm
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008
CCC, don't you find it rather AMAZING how much TRUST LVLIBERTY is willing to put into the Federal Government on this...
that he would NEVER put in their hands on a ....domestic program?!?!??
Posted by Mask at 06/13/2008 @ 12:36pm
And finally you have the fact that Al Qaeda trains all insurgents in good Muslim fashion to lie to your enemies.
Posted by lvliberty1
as opposed to here, where the gov't lies to its people.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 12:37pm
sjchermark-You are far far far far far far far more likely to be killed in your bath tub than be killed by a terrorist and that will remain true forever..It's quite sad that you guys exist in a constant state of fear of that which is highly unlikely to ever affect you.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/13/2008 @ 12:45pm
sjchermark-Your spouse or children are thousands of times more likely to kill you than a terrorist is.What you really should fear is that which you love and hang out with because they are far more likely to kill you.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/13/2008 @ 12:48pm
I said that most of you leftists that post here have an ideology that is committed to the downfall of our constition and thus that it is that specific classification that I consider traitorous and not simply by being anti-war. Furthermore, I did not say all of those type of people should be shot. I didn't even say they should be incarcerated. You and others wanted to read that into my statement on your own bias.
I simply said that there was a time when we incarcerated or shot traitors. Today we call them ant-war leftists.
I was labelling not pronouncing a proposed sentence. That is the typical misreading, distortion and hyperbole of the left.
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/13/2008
Ok Father Death.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 12:53pm
The military is about the only branch of govt that I put any real trust in.
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/13/2008
You mean the ones who in the past bombed Red Cross buildings on accident? Yeah very much to be trusted.
Mask I do find it amazing that the people on the right who will call the Federal Governmnet incompetent, rightly so, will then argue that every single person the government kills or imprisons in combat is guilty whether there is actual proof against them or not. Even when all the proof says the person is not guilty they will still say they are guilty.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 12:56pm
LvLiberty-Everyone is taught to lie to their enemies.Your paranoia about communists and socialists is getting worse and one can be against your version of gdashd without being anti God.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/13/2008 @ 12:56pm
LvLiberty-Everyone is taught to lie to their enemies.Your paranoia about communists and socialists is getting worse and one can be against your version of gdashd without being anti God.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/13/2008
No didn't you hear? LV is representative of everything America stands for. If you disagree with him in anyway you are a traitor to this country and apparently he only meant this as an example but they used to shoot traitors. He wasn't saying that we should be shot as traitors but in the good old days that's what they would do.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 12:57pm
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/13/2008
Ok Father Death.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008
By the way. Just so you know LVL. This is your title from now on to me. I try to treat you with respect whether I disagree with you or not. But you don't treat anyone with respect. You are very judgmental for a "man of God." Anyone who calls me a traitor doesn't deserve my respect.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 1:00pm
Cccomfo1-LvLiberty believes that he is the standard by which everything is determined.If you agree with his political views then you love America and if you don't then you hate America.If you agree with his religious views then you go to heaven,but if you disagree with him then you go to hell..It would be nice if lvliberty could name any anti war people who were shot as traitors in our past.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/13/2008 @ 1:04pm
Cccomfo1-LvLiberty believes that he is the standard by which everything is determined.If you agree with his political views then you love America and if you don't then you hate America.If you agree with his religious views then you go to heaven,but if you disagree with him then you go to hell..It would be nice if lvliberty could name any anti war people who were shot as traitors in our past.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/13/2008
Where I come from we call that arrogance but maybe LA is weird like that. Funny aren't men of God supposed to be open minded? Last I checked the priests I knew growing up were open to many views and I never heard them criticizing people because they didn't agree with them.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 1:10pm
Hello Cccomfo1
You mentioned above that if guilty, the terrorists would not go free, they would be held after prosecution.
Unfortunately, sometimes guilty people do go free, especially if they have good lawyers.
A guy with the last name of Simpson comes to mind.
I, of course, do not claim to know the truth on that for certain, it is the belief of most people in this country that Mr. Simpson navigated his way around the law quite nicely a decade ago.
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008 @ 1:17pm
"Libertarians strongly oppose government infringement of civil liberties such as restrictions on free expression (e.g., speech, press, or religious belief or practice), prohibitions on voluntary association, or encroachments on persons or property. Some make an exception when the infringement is a result of due process to establish or punish criminal behaviour."
Source: Wikipedia
You would think that the Preacher would side with the majority in this case, i.e., government carries burden to establish due process prior to infringement of an individual's rights. You would think that most libertarians, being skeptical of government infringement, would set higher standards for establishment of due process than an ordinary citizen would for instance.
Perhaps the Preacher is to a Libertarian as George Bush is to a Compassionate Conservative?
Posted by OneVote at 06/13/2008 @ 1:19pm
Hello Cccomfor1,
I try to write somewhat correctly and I made a grammar error above that I want to correct.
I said "I, of course, do not claim to know the truth on that for certain, it is the belief of most people in this country that Mr. Simpson navigated his way around the law quite nicely a decade ago."
I meant "I, of course, do not claim to know the truth on that for certain, BUT it is the belief of most people in this country that Mr. Simpson navigated his way around the law quite nicely a decade ago."
Without the missing word "BUT" in my first post the sentence runs together.
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008 @ 1:21pm
Collin Powell says Obama's right about the direction our nation should be heading and that Obama's getting his vote. hsuB's job approval is dipping to low 20's and below. Yet McCave, as ignorant about computers as he is our economic needs, sticks to the hsuB presidency like a rock. The GOP is so full of reptiles on the verge of extinction that it's only appropriate that climate change is canning them in their soulless stasis... Rule of law got us past the time of dic'tator philosophy, the new con GOP can only exist if there is continual and devastating war leading us backwards to more lawless times. I say no more to the McCave MEC/MAD-- GOP.
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/13/2008 @ 1:22pm
Hello Cccomfor1,
I try to write somewhat correctly and I made a grammar error above that I want to correct.
I said "I, of course, do not claim to know the truth on that for certain, it is the belief of most people in this country that Mr. Simpson navigated his way around the law quite nicely a decade ago."
I meant "I, of course, do not claim to know the truth on that for certain, BUT it is the belief of most people in this country that Mr. Simpson navigated his way around the law quite nicely a decade ago."
Without the missing word "BUT" in my first post the sentence runs together.
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008
Hell I believe Simpson should have been in jail too.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 1:25pm
The military is about the only branch of govt that I put any real trust in.----Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/13/2008
So by that logic, "the military" should in your view be RUNNING the government?
Posted by Mask at 06/13/2008 @ 1:26pm
I tried to search for the contradictory evidence that you are speaking of LVL. I can't find it. Please I would love to be educated on this man so show me.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 1:27pm
Unfortunately, sometimes guilty people do go free, especially if they have good lawyers.
A guy with the last name of Simpson comes to mind.---Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008
And by THIS logic, anybody ACCUSED must be guilty and cannot be tried to determine their guilt, because O.J. was guilty and went free after a trial.
Posted by Mask at 06/13/2008 @ 1:27pm
Hello Cccomfo1
You mentioned above that if guilty, the terrorists would not go free, they would be held after prosecution.
Unfortunately, sometimes guilty people do go free, especially if they have good lawyers.
A guy with the last name of Simpson comes to mind.
I, of course, do not claim to know the truth on that for certain, it is the belief of most people in this country that Mr. Simpson navigated his way around the law quite nicely a decade ago.
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008
This is very true. But I doubt most normal people living in the Middle East can afford a good lawyer. They don't make 1/25 of what OJ had.
While it is true that some of them may end up walking free and that is regrettable does that mean we should arrest and hold more innocent people than criminals? The accepted, through research and corroborated by a few people who have worked at Gitmo, view is that the majority of the people held at Gitmo are guilty of nothing. Like that fellow they let go now long ago after having proven him innocent in the first 6 months he was still held for 3 years.
That I believe is the difference between views on this matter. Some people are willing to let innocent people be punished to catch a few guilty ones. Others are willing to let a few guilty ones go to protect innocent people. The reason I am willing to let a few guilty people go is because yes they may go back and fight and more than likely get killed. If you arrest an innocent person, torture them and then jail them you are creating more terrorists because I guarantee you at least some of these innocent peoples families have a hatred of the US now and probably many of the innocents being held. I would rather one terrorist goes free while 3 innocent people do as well than jail 3 innocent people for every 1 guilty terrorist. Those figures are my own just for examples.
We are breeding more and more hatred for the US through our occupation and actions like Blackwater shooting 17 innocent unarmed women and children or killing the Presidents bodyguard. The more hatred we create the more people we create that want to see Americans dead.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 1:38pm
I want people to notice the difference in mentalities by the way of the right and the left on this page. I have said repeatedly that LVL, Happy and all our local conserves are good people who all want the best for the US they just see it being achieved in a different way.
For my efforts of compassion and understanding we get called traitors and told that there was a time when we would have all been shot. That's the difference in mentalities. People like LVL believe only the path they find to be right is the right one. Where as some of us believe two people can be seeking the same good in the US but think of achieving it in different ways. Thanks Father Death for your shining example what of what a hypocrite a man God can be.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 1:44pm
I read the opinion last night with a particular concentration on Scalia's dissent (I plan on taking another look at Robert's this weekend)
If you'll forgive the self-promotion, this is part of a post on Boudemiene I put on my blog (http:\\jeffersonlocke.blogspot.com) last night--
It's a surprisingly encouraging victory and I expect I'll be sending a celebratory check to the ACLU.
I think Scalia's dissent is the more amusing of the two. His assertions that the opinion "will almost certainly cause more Americans to be killed" and that "The Nation will live to regret what the Court has done today" are exercises in hysterics rather than legal thought. His assertion that the military can't always tell who is a threat and who isn't (invoking stories of released Gitmo detainees killing people after release) is an argument for more civilian oversight, not less. If the military can't get it right, what innocent persons are being held as unlawful enemy combatants?
His dissent also ignores that, in Eisentrager, the holding that constitutional protections didn't apply to an alien enemy was distinguishable since no proper procedure had determined that the Gitmo detainees were enemies to begin with. The petitoners in Eisentrager were "active in the hostile service of an enemy power". Scalia embraces the assumption that Gitmo detainees are enemy aliens, when the enemy part is a key fact in dispute for each detainee.
Scalia also has no response to the implication of the opinion's argument that, if US protections don't apply, who has the jurisdiction? The United States is sovereign in Gitmo in all but name. This is also important since Eisentrager also relied on the petitoners never having been within US jurisdiction. Scalia would have us believe the administration's fiction that Gitmo is somehow a territory beyond the reach of anyone's authority.
He also ignores, as the opinion doesn't, Eisentrager's emphasis on the practical difficulties of effecting the habeas writ on the petitioners in that case.
Posted by brunowe at 06/13/2008 @ 1:48pm
same message as that given to Imnobody
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/13/2008
Did you not essentially call me a traitor LVL? You say that I want the downfall of America that even today is the same as being a traitor.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 1:52pm
Hello Cccomfo1
It may not be good if we do something now that causes somebody additional to hate us.
But this world is not a perfect place.
If we fight a battle (as we are now) where we are careful to not do anything that would cause that to happen, then in my opinion we are handicapping ourselves too much, to our detriment, in this fight.
And, in my opinion, we did not start this fight to begin with. People will cite Iraq as the cause but I would point out the other areas of the world and other incidents (such as Islamic anger at Danish newspaper cartoons), that show this angst some of the Islamic world has is not just about the United States, let along our recent actions. I would also include all the acts of terror in the 90's and you can go even farther back to the murder of the Israeli Olympic atheletes in 1972 as examples of how elements of Islam hate us. (And that topic is pertinent now because Jim McKay, the ABC sports anchor who wound up covering a serious news story as well as anybody could have, just passed away).
Some people would say a lot of this now got stirred up by Iraq but I would contend it was coming anyway, at some time.
So I believe the bigger picture has to be addressed first in order to get to the point where people in the world can have real peace and opportunity, which radical Islam does not want to see happen. They do not want us to even be alive and they do not want Islamic run countries to have free people with opportunity.
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008 @ 1:54pm
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008
I completely agree with you on all aspects of what you said. You can not fight a war walking on egg shells. However the thing I point out to folks is that the War on Terror will not be a war of force. We have to win the hearts and minds of people who would otherwise hate us in order for us to stop them from becoming terrorists at all. You can't fight terrorists because for everyone you kill you create a martyr for some.
You will never be able to create enough fear to stop radical Islamist members from going towards terrorism because they don't fear death. So we not only have to address attacks head on as you said, but we have to address their recruitment by creating a more favorable view of America everywhere in the world with more acts of humanitarianism and less lashing out.
On a side not I appreciate the you correctly differentiate radical Islam from Islam in general.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 2:03pm
Some people are willing to let innocent people be punished to catch a few guilty ones. Others are willing to let a few guilty ones go to protect innocent people.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008
The field of statistics has long identified these types of errors:
Type I errors (the "false positive"): the error of rejecting the null hypothesis given that it is actually true; e.g., A court finding a person guilty of a crime that they did not actually commit.
Type II errors (the "false negative"): the error of failing to reject the null hypothesis given that the alternative hypothesis is actually true; e.g., A court finding a person not guilty of a crime that they did actually commit.
A type I error is often considered to be more serious, and therefore more important to avoid, than a type II error. The hypothesis test procedure is therefore adjusted so that there is a guaranteed 'low' probability of rejecting the null hypothesis wrongly; this probability is never 0. This probability of a type I error can be precisely computed.
The exact probability of a type II error is generally unknown.
Posted by Balrog at 06/13/2008 @ 2:10pm
Hello Cccomfo1,
Yes there is a difference between radical Islam and Islam in general.
In 1978 when our embassy personnel were taken hostage in Iran, Anwar Sadat was angry about that and said "This is not Islam"
I remember those words, unfortunately radical Islam murdered him because he made peace with Israel.
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008 @ 2:11pm
and you can go even farther back to the murder of the Israeli Olympic atheletes in 1972 as examples of how elements of Islam hate us.
what kind of nonsense is this?
the Palestinians attacked us? they attacked Israel.
in your weak mind it all runs together, don't it.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 2:15pm
the terrorist attacks by palestinians and others were committed by individuals, NOT BY RADICAL ISLAM.
there are many attacks on arabs committed by jews and christians. we don't say that they were committed by radical judaism or radical christianity.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 2:19pm
and you can go even farther back to the murder of the Israeli Olympic atheletes in 1972 as examples of how elements of Islam hate us.
what kind of nonsense is this?
the Palestinians attacked us? they attacked Israel.
in your weak mind it all runs together, don't it.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008
No but I do agree with him. We can't allow the attack of another country either. Whether it be Israel or someone else. When they attacked Spain and England I was fine with supporting concurrent action too. Granted our only goal is not to protect Israel but I am fine with the offer of some support to countries that are attacked. Not as world police but just like the world offered it's support to us when they took down the towers.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 2:20pm
Hello emile duBois,
If somebody attacks Israel they are attacking me, as far as I am concerned.
I can not be responsible for the fact that my mind is weak (according to you) and that everything in it (or what amount my weak mind can hold) runs together.
If somebody attacks Israel they are attacking me.
If somebody attacks Mississauga, Ontario, they are attacking me.
If somebody attacks Richmond, Virginia they are attacking me.
You need to remember:
1 - As stated in one of my remarks above, I am part Virginian.
2 - I have been to Canada more times than I can count, so I am part Canadian.
3 - I have never been to Israel, but if I had the time and money to travel overseas that is one of the places I would like to check out, so I am part Israeli.
So I am a complex person, eh?
Posted by sjchermak at 06/13/2008 @ 2:32pm
So I am a complex person, eh?
Posted by sjchermak
no, you are deluded.
when someone attacks a child in Gaza, it's none of your concern
if someone beats a prisoner to death in an American military prison, that is not your concern.
I won't go on. you disgust me with your very selective morality.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 2:39pm
And by THIS logic, anybody ACCUSED must be guilty and cannot be tried to determine their guilt, because O.J. was guilty and went free after a trial.
Posted by Mask at 06/13/2008
Er-- then the hsuB/cHeney admin-- should 'at the very least' go to trial... right?
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/13/2008 @ 2:49pm
Collin Powell says Obama's right about the direction our nation should be heading and that Obama's getting his vote. hsuB's job approval is dipping to low 20's and below. Yet McCave, as ignorant about computers as he is our economic needs, sticks to the hsuB presidency like a rock. The GOP is so full of reptiles on the verge of extinction that it's only appropriate that climate change is canning them in their soulless stasis... Rule of law got us past the time of dic'tator philosophy, the new con GOP can only exist if there is continual and devastating war leading us backwards to more lawless times. I say no more to the McCave MEC/MAD-- GOP.
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/13/2008 @ 2:57pm
Oops, that last post was meant to copy somewhere else.
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/13/2008 @ 3:00pm
sjchermak
The Munich atrocity was committed by Black September, a decidedly secular-nationalist group whose connection to Fatah is still under dispute.
The fact that a given string of terror attacks were committed by Arabs does not mean that they are part of one continuum. Scalia made the same mistake in his dissent when he conflated the Hezbollah attacks in Beirut in 1983 with Ramzi Yousef's attack on the WTC in 1993 with al-Qaida's outrages.
Although I agree that we didn't start this fight, going into Iraq was a strategically dubious move that enhanced the other side.
Posted by brunowe at 06/13/2008 @ 3:00pm
http://tinyurl.com/5wcka5
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/13/2008 @ 3:05pm
LvLiberty-No,I'm not suffering from a reading comprehension disability.You were quite clear as to your meaning.It's funny that you only picked that one sentence to respond to,though.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/13/2008 @ 3:46pm
A moment of silence as NBC's Tim Russert died this afternoon, June 13th 2008. A forthright journalist, he was 58 and died on the job....his political candor will be missed.
Posted by leftofcenter at 06/13/2008 @ 3:48pm
A forthright journalist, he was 58 and died on the job....his political candor will be missed.
Posted by leftofcenter
I cannot agree with this. he was a liar. in the Plame matter specifically.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 3:56pm
Enjoy posting with you too Herr duBois
I am current reading the second of two books on the history of financial speculation. With the 4th of July coming up, I may reread Bernard Bailyn and Gordon Wood.
Posted by brunowe at 06/13/2008 @ 4:12pm
emile, please feel free to elucidate.
Posted by leftofcenter at 06/13/2008 @ 4:15pm
Brunowe, I'll look these guys up.
Lefty, there was an instance where he was on meet the press, with some of the participants of the Plame matter. and he hid the fact that he too was a participant. I'm not putting this very elegantly, but I hope you get the idea.
it gives me no pleasure to speak ill of the dead.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 4:49pm
it gives me no pleasure to speak ill of the dead.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008
You could at least wait until his body temp. drops 10 degrees before you start hammering on the guy JR.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/13/2008 @ 4:56pm
He thus argued that the Revolutionary rhetoric of liberty and freedom was not simply propagandistic but rather central to their understanding of their situation. This evidence was used to displace Charles Beard's theory, then the dominant understanding of the American Revolution, that the American Revolution was primarily a matter of class warfare and that the rhetoric of liberty was meaningless.
I see what you mean, Brunowe. I had no idea that I too had been "replaced".
of course it helps to go to primary sources. I did not have the benefit of those or of Mr. Bailyn's or Mr. Beard's work. my conclusions were arrived by my reasoning based on more general histories of the colonies. I appreciate that you do not pull rank during a discussion, despite the fact that you appear to be more erudite than I.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 4:57pm
Wolfgang1
he was a public figure. he was being praised for his honesty.
does this issue of my poor timing also apply, say if Bin Laden dies?
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 5:00pm
he was being praised for his honesty.
does this issue of my poor timing also apply, say if Bin Laden dies?
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008
No, actually, I just found it somewhat amusing in a morbid sort of way. The guy has been dead, what, 30 minutes, and you already have hammered him. Nothing wrong with what you said at all.
I also find it odd in human nature that if someone, who was a complete jackass in life dies people will all of a sudden start acting like that person was some sort of saint. I don't know enough about Russert aside from seeing him on his show.
If Bin Forgotten ever dies or is found dead, the rethugs will cry a very long time because they'll have to come up with a new scary guy to flash up on their campaign commercials.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/13/2008 @ 5:14pm
Wolfgang1
thank you. let me just say I would have had the same reaction to Lefty's statement when he was alive.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 5:23pm
he was being praised for his honesty.
does this issue of my poor timing also apply, say if Bin Laden dies?
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008
Are you comparing Tim Russert to Obama?
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 5:32pm
Are you comparing Tim Russert to Obama?
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008
God I the Republican Smear machine. That was supposed to be Osama.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 5:32pm
Summary: On Meet the Press, host Tim Russert let former Reagan adviser Ken Adelman assert without challenge that "no one knew" that intelligence indicating Iraq had weapons of mass destruction "wasn't true" prior to the U.S.-led invasion in 2003. In fact, members of the intelligence community, including senior CIA analysts, challenged the accuracy of the intelligence that Iraq had WMDs. from media matters
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 5:33pm
If Bin Forgotten ever dies or is found dead, the rethugs will cry a very long time because they'll have to come up with a new scary guy to flash up on their campaign commercials.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/13/2008
Maybe that's why they are building Iran's Pres up to be the next great devil.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/13/2008 @ 5:34pm
If Bin Forgotten ever dies or is found dead, the rethugs will cry a very long time because they'll have to come up with a new scary guy to flash up on their campaign commercials.
Posted by Wolfgang1 at 06/13/2008
And the reason they let him go and didn't even try to find him. Remember hsuB saying he was no longer concerned with finding OBL.
Not so funny that they even had all those bad guy cards... talk about the hidden trump card under the sleeve.
Kinda explains a lot-- not much unlike hsuB's concern for our troops by giving up golf-- why hsuB's so concerned about everything, he just gave up thinking about anything a long time ago.
Now McCave will follow in those McGoosesteps.
Just say NO to McCave's MEC/MAD/GOP.
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/13/2008 @ 5:34pm
Two-and-a-half years before Mohamed ElBaradei and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) won the Nobel Peace Prize, friends of the Administration were trashing them in the media. Pushing for war with Iraq, these hawks insisted that inspections don't work. In early March 2003, Tim Russert pushed their case further, by repeating lies to "prove" inspections don't work. Those lies speak volumes about media coverage of the WMD story then and now.
Russert's lie: (repeated three times) Inspectors never found any nuclear weapons program in Iraq until 1995, when Saddam's son-in-law defected and revealed secret nuclear program unknown to the inspectors. It was sheer luck, not the inspections, that kept Saddam from building 21 nuclear bombs by 2003.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-fiderer/the-nobel-prize-and-russe_b_ 9307.html
Posted by emile duBois at 06/13/2008 @ 5:37pm
It would be nice if lvliberty could name any anti war people who were shot as traitors in our past.----Posted by i'm nobody at 06/13/2008
still suffering from reading comprehension disability?----Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/13/2008
"We used to incarcerate and even shoot traitors. Today we just call them the "anti-war left"----Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
Fine distinction, huh?
Posted by Mask at 06/13/2008 @ 5:56pm
"We used to incarcerate and even shoot traitors. Today we just call them the "anti-war left"----Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/12/2008
traitors = them = anti-war left.
Ask your God for forgiveness; go and sin no more.
Posted by Balrog at 06/13/2008 @ 6:04pm
Ask your God for forgiveness; go and sin no more.
Posted by Balrog at 06/13/2008
¬^¬ has nothing better to do than sin for the MEC/MAD/GOP. For ¬<¬, that comes before anything and leads to everything. ¬>¬ even feeds depleted uranium to his family as it's so harmless... But to ¬^¬, it's no sin, proves god's love, having faith-- like handling snakes or like snakes on a Plame-- it proves to ¬<¬ a godly love is to be had...
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/13/2008 @ 6:21pm
HELLO
http://tinyurl.com/6sbymg
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/13/2008 @ 6:30pm
Posted by Balrog at 06/13/2008
See, Balrog, LL doesn't use logic like "If A=B, and B=C, then A=C".
He says crazy stuff, then if it sounds TOO outrageous (even for a fellow Hard Rightie...or any decent human being to defend), he claims WE are misinterpretting what he says.
Though the logic is inescapable.
Posted by Mask at 06/13/2008 @ 7:47pm
The military is about the only branch of govt that I put any real trust in.
Posted by lvliberty1
the government puts things in the water!
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/13/2008 @ 11:25pm
The US has complied with that as all of the juveniles below the age of 18 at Gitmo were released back in 2004 and 2006. The Protocol also does not specify either the how or the time frame for doing so.
Posted by lvliberty1
Omar Ahmed Khadr (born September 19, 1986) is the fourth child in the Canadian Khadr family. He was captured by American forces at the age of 15 following a four-hour firefight with militants in the village of Ayub Kheyl, Afghanistan.[1]
A Canadian citizen born in Toronto,[2][3] he is the youngest prisoner held in extrajudicial detention by the United States and has been frequently referred to as a child soldier.[4][5] The only Western citizen remaining in Guantanamo, Khadr is unique in that Canada has refused to seek extradition or repatriation despite the urgings of Amnesty International, UNICEF, the Canadian Bar Association and other prominent organisations.[6][7][8][9]
Khadr is the only Guantanamo detainee who has faced a judge and who is not boycotting the military tribunals,[10] and has spent six years in the Guantanamo Bay detention camps charged with war crimes and providing support to terrorism after allegedly throwing a grenade that killed a US soldier.[11] In February 2008, the Pentagon accidentally released documents that revealed that although Khadr was present during the firefight, there was no other evidence that he had thrown the grenade. In fact, military officials had originally reported that another of the surviving militants had thrown the grenade just before being killed.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/13/2008 @ 11:34pm
So now the only thing I can do is relax, and wait for the day when I can be killed in the terrorist attack that will probably happen because some of the terrorists are able to go free (and thus free to go back and try to kill us) because now they have their "rights".
Posted by sjchermak
BOO!
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/13/2008 @ 11:37pm
And finally you have the fact that Al Qaeda trains all insurgents in good Muslim fashion to lie to your enemies.
Posted by lvliberty1
go get 'em, truthmeister.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/13/2008 @ 11:41pm
Granted our only goal is not to protect Israel but I am fine with the offer of some support to countries that are attacked.
Posted by Cccomfo1
so the u.s. should attack the u.s. for attacking iraq?
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/13/2008 @ 11:54pm
Although I agree that we didn't start this fight,
Posted by brunowe
no, oil did.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/13/2008 @ 11:55pm
Although I agree that we didn't start this fight,
Posted by brunowe
not so sure.
no, i'm not going to research the TREATY OF AL-BALU OF 1916.
or argue about what the sultan of tiskrin said to secretary woodhole in 1908.
but no one is attacking surinam.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/14/2008 @ 12:01am
Speaking at a joint news conference with Prime Minister Berlusconi, Mr. Bush said the White House will study the narrow 5-4 court opinion to see if new legislation is needed.
"It was a deeply divided court. And I strongly agree with those who dissented," he said.
hmm?
wasn't he "elected" 5-4?
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/14/2008 @ 01:07am
er-- Just say NO to McCave's MIC/MAD/GOP.
Posted by hsuBfools at 06/14/2008 @ 02:10am
And finally you have the fact that Al Qaeda trains all insurgents in good Muslim fashion to lie to your enemies. -----Posted by lvliberty1
BTW, this is another LL classic.
Works like this....his fave branch of Gov't (the military) "detains" somebody.
The detainee claims to be innocent and that they were tortured.
BUT, see, they're Muslims. And (as LL knows) Muslims are taught to lie. And "the military" is the only branch of Gov't that LL trusts....
so...obviously those detainees are all "terrorists" and they're "not being tortured" since Muslims all lie and The Military always tells the truth.
BTW, consider THIS logic...
WHO else does LVLIB trust and knows always tells the Truth (especially if "lied about" by an Evil Enemy)?
Ergo...who is he comparing "the military" to?
Posted by Mask at 06/14/2008 @ 07:27am
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/14/2008
LVLIB...you're not an American.
Oh, you live on the LAND...but you really don't believe in the IDEA of the country.
You've said it numerous times...most recently here.
You support ONLY the military. (I support the democratic republic that is this country, including its judicial system, Bill of Rights, and democratic institutions. I also support a strong military being used PROPERLY by experts...not ideologues and idiots.)
And your loyalty to even AMERICAN military and intelligence falls, when conflicted by ISRAELI intelligence (remember? the NIE and Iran's nuke program?)
If you had been an adult 50 years ago, you'd have supported McCarthy and stripped dozens of people of their rights for fear of "Communist infiltration" and told us "You know Communists are taught that it's okay to lie....I believe in our FBI and Mr. Hoover and Sen. Joe."
You would turn this country into a military dictatorship with theocratic underpinings...all in a foolishly and sick effort to "save America".
YOU and the fortunately decreasing amount of people like you, more than any terrorists, pose a greater threat to America.
Thankfully, your time is coming to an end...even if McCain wins.
Posted by Mask at 06/14/2008 @ 10:41am
LvLibertry-No sane and intelligent observer would arrive at the conclusions you arrive at by reading these boards.You see all of that because you want to see it.The thing you keep forgetting when you do your left bad/ right good thing is that the terrorists are right wingers who are religious fundamentalists who have everything in common with you and nothing in common with the left.The only thing that separates you from the terrorists is the accident of birth,but you are the same types of people.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/14/2008 @ 11:00am
The thing you keep forgetting when you do your left bad/ right good thing is that the terrorists are right wingers who are religious fundamentalists who have everything in common with you and nothing in common with the left.The only thing that separates you from the terrorists is the accident of birth,but you are the same types of people.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/14/2008
Bingo.
Posted by Balrog at 06/14/2008 @ 11:34am
the satanic preacher is a tedious fool.
how do we deal with creeps like him? may I suggest ignore. maybe he'll go away.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/14/2008 @ 12:04pm
There is a simple truth that those on the left refuse to understand: ideals and principles are good things, but they don't stop flying bullets. Laws mean things only to those who follow them, to the barbarians of the world they are merely ink on paper. Within the confines of our peaceful democracies, rights exist only because we agree that they do. While I firmly beleive that these are "endowed by our creator" they require our cooperation to make them true in real life. There is nothing concrete to stop those who disagree: under the constitution you have a right to life, but if a suicide bomber strikes possessing that right will not stop the shrapnel from ripping you to shreds. To the jihadists, our laws are either meaningless or tools to be used against us. This ruling is merely another example of our foolishly cooperating with them, feeding the beast that will one day devour us. If we cannot divorce actions in the real world from the realm of ideals, we will one day find those ideals only a memory.
Posted by JO3 at 06/14/2008 @ 2:15pm
another member of the grrr, kill, kill club
and
you are nothing but a hater. and you disgust me. Posted by emile duBois
No emile, I am a warrior. I hate death and I abhor war. The death of any person before their natural end is a loss to the human family as a whole. War is a monster that crushes everything that gets in it's path: enemy and ally alike. Bodies, buildings, cultures, nothing is safe when war arrives. War is the second worse act that a nation or a man can perform.
However, there are far too many in this world who do not agree with these ideals. They see other lives as something they can use, or as obstacles to their desires. You cannot ignore them or reason with them, and any attempt to mollify them becomes appeasement and extortion. To accept this is to accept tyranny, which is the worst act that a nation or man can perform.
So I choose the lesser evils of war and death to the greater evils of tyranny. That is the mark of a warrior: to walk into the crucible with open eyes, accepting responsibility for the evils done as result but refusing to let fear or guilt intimidate you into submission and slavery.
Call me names if you like or ignore me if you wish, it won't matter to me. I would like your friendship and acceptance, but I wont let their absence intimidate me either.
Posted by JO3 at 06/14/2008 @ 2:40pm
Another week with no swiftboatable negative news on Obama!
Posted by winyahn at 06/14/2008 @ 2:46pm
Well, I sure hope Bush has learned his lesson. All enemy combatants must be left on the battlefield with a bullet in the head.
That's the only policy that is sure to hold up to SCOTUS review.
Posted by marybretbrad at 06/12/2008
What a shame! Just by that posting I know that you necons are fascist Nazis in the bottom of your heart. Is it not the right to life more important that any other right?
But don't care he already teached the lesson. Hundreds of thousands of innocent Iraqis killed by our plane bombs and/or confused with enemy combatants. Or might you think that it is worthy killing 200,000 persons if we knew that within them there is Osama Bin Laden? Are foreign lives qualitatively different from American lives?
You people in the right that claim to follow God's word don't remember what was said about Sodome: And God said :"If there was just ONE innocent man, I would spare out Sodome from what is coming..." Don't you have compassion for the probably hundreds of innocents there???
As for the Habeas Corpus rights (or equivalents) I believe they are alive and well in almost all of the mature democracies in the West.
I don't understand that pseudo nationalism: "we Americans don't have rights in Canada, why should we grant them in the 1st place???" We all these Bushy actions we are only defeating our nation's most greatest ideals. Go to China there is no Habeas Corpus there.
Posted by Frank42 at 06/14/2008 @ 2:55pm
if a suicide bomber strikes possessing that right will not stop the shrapnel from ripping you to shreds.
Posted by JO3 at 06/14/2008
In its entire history, how many suicide bombers have attacked the US? Not including the thousands of kamikaze attacks in WWII, which occurred outside of the US...
As someone who participated in "Duck and Cover" drills in grade school, I have to say that The Soviet Union posed a far greater threat to this nation for the 40+ years of The Cold War, yet we didn't see the level of hysteria and outright FEAR that we see today towards Al Quaeda. I just don't get it.
Posted by Balrog at 06/14/2008 @ 4:44pm
Posted by Balrog
ten guys, ten automatic rifles, ten malls.
synchronize watches....
the economy collapses in a day.
yet it doesn't happen.
why not?
Saturday, June 14, 2008 4:50:23 PM
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/14/2008 @ 4:50pm
Look the neo-con position here is clear...
"They're all guilty...and if they're not, we'll release eventually...and if we don't release them right away, they'll get over years and years of captivity and 'intensive interrogation'...and anyway, they're probably all guilty!"
Posted by Mask at 06/14/2008 @ 4:52pm
supportingly of our military and any of their efforts against terrorism.
posted by doesn'tunderstandliberty
actually, diplomats and police do a much better job with that stuff.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/14/2008 @ 4:53pm
we didn't see the level of hysteria and outright FEAR that we see today towards Al Quaeda. I just don't get it.
Posted by Balrog
oh no? they were building fall out shelters and stocking up on food. people were losing their jobs all over the place. people had to sign loyalty oaths. and that was at a time when no American city had been attacked since the war of 1812.
I don't disagree with your conclusions.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/14/2008 @ 4:55pm
how do we deal with creeps like him? may I suggest ignore. maybe he'll go away.
Posted by emile duBois
well, he is the "face" of much of the selfishness and hate we'd like to rid the world of....
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/14/2008 @ 4:57pm
The thing you keep forgetting when you do your left bad/ right good thing is that the terrorists are right wingers who are religious fundamentalists who have everything in common with you and nothing in common with the left.The only thing that separates you from the terrorists is the accident of birth,but you are the same types of people.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/14/2008
sinking the ship for the rest of us......
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/14/2008 @ 4:57pm
Another week with no swiftboatable negative news on Obama!
Posted by winyahn
i saw on foxmews that he's a member of al-qinda.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/14/2008 @ 5:00pm
Within the confines of our peaceful democracies, rights exist only because we agree that they do.
so why do you strip people of their rights in other countries?
While I firmly beleive that these are "endowed by our creator" they require our cooperation to make them true in real life.
well, the creator is well endowed!
There is nothing concrete to stop those who disagree:
i thought you called that "impeachment".
under the constitution you have a right to life,
and liberty!
but if a suicide bomber strikes possessing that right will not stop the shrapnel from ripping you to shreds.
and when was the last time that happened? there are 7 million u.s. muslims. you think ONE would...... but no. maybe all this trouble is about jobs and respect and religion is just an ugly faηade.
To the jihadists,
you should worry more about the nihilistic jihadists at the local school.
our laws are either meaningless or tools to be used against us.
better scrap 'em. i heard they've got some along your lines ready for use in chad.
This ruling is merely another example of our foolishly cooperating with them,
no, the ruling is cooperating with jefferson and franklin
feeding the beast that will one day devour us.
roy scheider already blew it up!
If we cannot divorce actions in the real world from the realm of ideals, we will one day find those ideals only a memory.
yeah, the day martial law is imposed......
Posted by JO3
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/14/2008 @ 5:18pm
LVLIB...you're not an American.
Oh, you live on the LAND...but you really don't believe in the IDEA of the country.
You've said it numerous times...most recently here.
You support ONLY the military. (I support the democratic republic that is this country, including its judicial system, Bill of Rights, and democratic institutions. I also support a strong military being used PROPERLY by experts...not ideologues and idiots.)
And your loyalty to even AMERICAN military and intelligence falls, when conflicted by ISRAELI intelligence (remember? the NIE and Iran's nuke program?)
If you had been an adult 50 years ago, you'd have supported McCarthy and stripped dozens of people of their rights for fear of "Communist infiltration" and told us "You know Communists are taught that it's okay to lie....I believe in our FBI and Mr. Hoover and Sen. Joe."
You would turn this country into a military dictatorship with theocratic underpinings...all in a foolishly and sick effort to "save America".
YOU and the fortunately decreasing amount of people like you, more than any terrorists, pose a greater threat to America.
Thankfully, your time is coming to an end...even if McCain wins.
Posted by Mask at 06/14/2008
Cheers Mask! How many times have I told this to people to only get looks of disdain. Loving America does NOT mean going along with everything the government says. We are meant in this country to voice our problems with the governments actions. The only TRUE patriots in this country the people who truly love their country are those who serve it and those who spend their time and energy trying to make it better through action to oppose an out of control government.
People like LVL are not patriots, they are sheep. They are the people that Hitler appealed to to carry out his actions. People who will believe anything the government tells them. People who will hand over their rights and burn the Constitution if Bush tells them that action will protect them. If there are any traitors to the true meaning of this country it's folks like LVL, people who decry those who speak out against their own country when they proceed with actions we believe are not becoming of America.
Your assessment about McCarthy is perfectly correct. LVL is a zealot not a patriot. He doesn't even understand what it is to be an American yet he tells us we are unAmerican. Let the sheep follow Bush off the cliff. Their party is fading and if something drastic doesn't happen these self-styled but substance lacking Americans will be another page on the history books. While the people who tried to enact positive change in this country, not just militarism and sticking to archaic Biblical traditions, and many who gave their lives for it will be the ones who continue on into a better America. One which isn't a militaristic state bent on conquering the world but instead one that is a shining example to the rest of the world.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/14/2008 @ 6:29pm
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/14/2008
Look, at the simple points of his philosophy that LVLIB has made over the years here...
1. He's for "total war". Called for "Dresdenizing" as a "solution" to the War On Terror.
2. He has said that the ONLY part of the Government he trusts is "the military".
3. He has "hinted" that "traitors" (i.e. those who oppose HIS and the Bush Administration view on the war) were "in the past" SHOT.
4. He claims he wouldn't want "any religion, even his" to take over...but consistantly says he wouldn't elect anybody but a Jew or Christian to office.
5. He has no problem with rights being curtailed or threatened due to "national security".
6. He is utterly devoted to The Leader, though noting some "slight disagreements with him" (No Child Left Behind, global warming)...he remains loyal.
I don't like the term thrown around too loosely as it often is here and on other blogs by those on the Left.
But I think a clear, objective political scientist would have to conclude that LVLIB is an authoritarian (or of authoritarian mind-set) at the least...a fascist at worst.
Posted by Mask at 06/14/2008 @ 9:34pm
Whoa, control the hyperbole there LVL. You sound like the old men who shook their heads at the hippies of the 60's. The United States has been and will continue to be an ever-evolving country, simply by its beginnings and its fortunes and failings in the past 230 years. If the United States falls apart, it will be due to the corporatist greed soaking the country dry till it is a dried husk. We still have a Constitution that despite George's attempts to circumvent it still stands strong and is the guiding light of law in this nation. Simply compelling George to obey it will neither lead to the destruction of the republic nor cause a huge spike in terrorist attacks on the US. What it will do is re-establish us as a nation of laws that we all must respect and obey. We didn't stop that just because 3000 souls died on 9/11. And if we did, then we dishonor their memory.
Posted by yutsano at 06/15/2008 @ 12:28am
Really? When was the last time a diplomat stopped a suicide bomber?
who's attacking sweden? root causes, root causes. the iraq greedlustadventure has created lots of eager terrorists
When do we use policeman against people with grenade launchers?
oh yeah, those dudes with grenade launchers in front of montana steak house. how many terrorists nutcases have been busted because of interpol style business? wake up.
Posted by lvliberty1
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/15/2008 @ 12:33am
I would vote for the right candidate who is a Buddhist or Hindu.
Posted by lvliberty1
even if you knew they were going to hell?
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/15/2008 @ 12:47am
even if you knew they were going to hell?
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/15/2008
What does that have to do with political office?
Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/15/2008
classic.
peace be upon your house, brother larry.
how's the garden?
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/15/2008 @ 03:49am
I see. All of our problems are caused by the evil corporations.
Posted by lvliberty1
of course not.
like many shitty things in life, it's people.
greedy people.
i doubt leo fender wanted to take over iraq.
Posted by frosty zoom at 06/15/2008 @ 03:51am
certainly not all of america's problems are caused by greedy corporate officers, but the ones requiring huge gov't bail outs have been. where is that vaunted self sufficiently then?
Posted by emile duBois at 06/15/2008 @ 09:10am
leo fender
isn't that the guy who sang "before the next teardrop falls"?
Posted by emile duBois at 06/15/2008 @ 09:57am
LvLiberty-When do we use police to stop someone with a grenade launcher?In America we use police for that and for anytime a criminal has any type of weapon, including a tank.When was the last time anyone stopped a suicide bomber?How do you know that Romney curses you behind closed doors?You are not a dying breed nor did your breed create greatness.Every type of human has always existed and will always exist.Taking your kids to the doctor when they're sick does not cause hypochondria.
Posted by i'm nobody at 06/15/2008 @ 10:14am
Taking your kids to the doctor when they're sick does not cause hypochondria.
Posted by i'm nobody
yes, that was a beaut.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/15/2008 @ 10:47am
As an example, when I say that the military is the only branch of government I have real trust in currently, I actually put myself right in the mainstream of America.----Posted by lvliberty1 at 06/15/2008
What do the polls show the "mainstream of America" think about the war in Iraq?
...about Bush?
...about health care, education, etc.?
...about ABORTION?
Guess again, Larry. You're in the 25-30% on the Right edge.
Posted by Mask at 06/15/2008 @ 11:12am
LVL do you EVER answer anything directly? Or do you just snipe at what you label "unreasoned debate"? Dismissing a legitimate argument doesn't let you off the hook. I occasionally woner if you are what you say you are or if you're some kook trying to think of all the dittohead talking points just to get a rise out of us.
Posted by yutsano at 06/15/2008 @ 4:47pm
I occasionally woner if you are what you say you are or if you're some kook trying to think of all the dittohead talking points just to get a rise out of us.
Posted by yutsano
hmmm
Posted by emile duBois at 06/15/2008 @ 5:16pm
the one who proclaims himself a Christian the loudest lacks that quality that is the most characteristic of Christ: compassion , pity.
Posted by emile duBois at 06/15/2008 @ 5:18pm
"But many oil companies from those countries have expressed reservations about how to turn potential crude oil into product. Cuba doesn't have the refinery capacity, and the Cuban embargo prohibits the oil from coming to U.S. refineries, Pinon said.
The most recent high-profile contract with Cuba went to Brazil's state oil company, Petrobras. Cuba inked a contract with Petrobras in January, allowing the Brazilian energy giant to search for oil in the deep waters of the Gulf of Mexico that are within Cuba's sovereign territory. Brazil's foreign minister, Celso Amorim, traveled to Cuba last month and talked up the oil business, along with a joint venture between Cuba and Petrobras to produce lubricants."
Maybe we should break our embargo and cut a deal with Cuba. We could start drilling on their land too at that point.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/16/2008 @ 1:44pm
Wrong thread on above post.
Posted by Cccomfo1 at 06/16/2008 @ 1:46pm