So much, So little time...

A whole lot is going on in the world -- Lebanon, Eason Jordan, North Korea, Jeff Gannon, Ward Churchill, et al. I just don't seem to have the time (or maybe motivation?) to comment on any of it right now. Shame on me.

Free to Torture

Digby does it again.

I keep thinking I'm going to wake from this awful dream in which law professors (and former deputy attorneys general) of the highest reputation do not make arguments like this (from the important article by Jane Mayer in this week's New Yorker called "Outsourcing Torture"):

In a recent phone interview, Yoo was soft-spoken and resolute. “Why is it so hard for people to understand that there is a category of behavior not covered by the legal system?”

Go read. You will be a better person for it, at least a more knowledgeable person.

Secret Evidence

Listening to NPR this morning, I heard a story (listen to it here) about Ahmed Abu-Ali, a US citizen born in Texas and raised in Virginia. He was arrested in June of 2003 while taking an exam at Medina University in Saudi Arabia, where he was studying Islamic Sciences, by Saudi security seemingly at the behest of the US. He has been held in Saudi Arabia ever since without being charged, nor has he even been told why he was arrested. For more background on this case read these stories here, here, and here.

As it is, this case is a total corruption of US civil liberties and should make everyone wary of the actions of this administration. The recent major development of this case, as reported by the NPR story, was the submission of a motion to dismiss by the Justice Department base on secret evidence. Let me repeat that - SECRET EVIDENCE. This motion was submitted in lieu of an order by the federal judge to provide evidence of detainment or to bring charges against Abu-Ali.

"Secret evidence" is alleged evidence the government possesses, but deems to sensitive to release, even to the defendant and his attorney. You probably see the problem right there. How can a defendant and his attorney rebut evidence that they are not allowed to see? Supposedly, the Justice Department has used this classification of evidence in the deportation proceedings of a variety of non-US citizens since September 11th. Never has it been used in a case involving a US citizen until now. Extraordinary and preposterous don't come close to describing this legal move.

If anyone tries to make the case to you that it is ok if we give up some of our civil liberties in exchange for more security, this story is all you need to show them how misguided that belief is. The Justice Department and this administration is arguing that it has the right to arrest and detain indefinitely anyone without filing charges or even allowing the defendant or the defendant's attorney access to the alleged evidence that led to the arrest.

This is where head explodes in disbelief. Is this really the America that you want to live in?

Update: The World Organization for Human Rights USA has a very informative timeline of events for this case.

Power of State

Go read this post by Digby over at Hullabalo for your morning freak out. It discusses the rise of republican/neocon power centered on the state and the uneasiness it is causing among both democrats and republicans.

More later.

Embryo = Human Being

At least, according to a Cook County judge in Illinois, it is. I heard about this on NPR last week, but didn't get the full story. I almost forgot about it, but I am glad I didn't because this story needs to be noticed. Quite simply, this is SCARY. According to the story, the specific laws in Illinois are the basis for considering an embryo a human being, so it is doubtful that such a case will show up in many other states. But still, the precedent it sets is amazing. Hopefully, an appeals court will overrule this absurd case.

Update: Jesse over at Pandagon has a good post on this story as it relates to the cooling affect this ruling could have on IVF.

2cent$ on Social Security

Hey, everyone is doing it, so why not me?

In the latest presentation of Social Security reform, the president has offered a plan that ostensibly does nothing to solve the long-term "problems"(registration required) of the program.

Set aside for the moment the possibility that the program is working as it was intended.

So, the president yells "crisis", "bankruptcy" and "broken" and then proposes a plan that does nothing, in fact makes worse, the problem he says is there. How does that make sense? Simply adding private accounts will not a solvent system make. I don't see how anyone - republican, democrat, libertarian, independent - can support a plan that will cost an amazing amount of money to implement and do nothing to solve the alleged problems.

Something has to give. If we spend money to set up these private accounts, how is the governement going to make up for that revenue, not to mention the future loss of revenue through payroll taxes? Benefit cuts? Tax cap increase? Seriously, I want to know.

Why does the president and the administration really want to make this an issue? I don't believe they really intend to fix whatever problem they have convinced themselves there is. I think it is much simpler than that. They either want to get rid of it altogether or they want to lessen it's power as an issue for the democrats. They did it with Medicare and now they are even trying to do it with civil rights!

And yes, I am a cynic.

Libya & Oil

I've been meaning to post something on this, but limited time and other events have prevented me from doing so.

This story didn't get much play in the press or on TV (at least, not that I saw) and the recent allegation that North Korea sold uranium hexafloride to Libya has totally overshadowed it. I am not sure there is anything to the fact that US oil companies were awarded 11 of the 15 exploratory contracts Libya offered, but it seems to hint at an awful lot of back-scratching. All in all, it seems like an interesting story line that I should learn more about.

Pierce-ing the Illusion

Charles Pierce is my hero.

You do not own their courage.

The people who stood in line Sunday did not stand in line to make Americans feel good about themselves.

You do not own their courage.

They did not stand in line to justify lies about Saddam and al-Qaeda, so you don't own their courage, Stephen Hayes. They did not stand in line to justify lies about weapons of mass destruction, or to justify the artful dodginess of Ahmad Chalabi, so you don't own their courage, Judith Miller. They did not stand in line to provide pretty pictures for vapid suits to fawn over, so you don't own their courage, Howard Fineman, and neither do you, Chris Matthews.

You do not own their courage.

They did not stand in line in order to justify the dereliction of a kept press. They did not stand in line to make right the wrongs born out of laziness, cowardice, and the easy acceptance of casual lying. They did not stand in line for anyone's grand designs. They did not stand in line to play pawns in anyone's great game, so you don't own their courage, you guys in the PNAC gallery.

You do not own their courage.

They did not stand in line to provide American dilettantes with easy rhetorical weapons, so you don't own their courage, Glenn Reynolds, with your cornpone McCarran act out of the bowels of a great university that deserves a helluva lot better than your sorry hide. They did not stand in line to be the instruments of tawdry vilification and triumphal hooting from bloghound commandos. They did not stand in line to become useful cudgels for cheap American political thuggery, so you don't own their courage, Freeper Nation.

You do not own their courage.

They did not stand in line to justify a thousand mistakes that have led to more than a thousand American bodies. They did not stand in line for the purpose of being a national hypnotic for a nation not even their own. They did not stand in line for being the last casus belli standing. They did not stand in line on behalf of people's book deals, TV spots, honorarium checks, or tinpot celebrity. They did not stand in line to be anyone's talking points.

You do not own their courage.

We all should remember that.

Oh, but the GOP will try to own it...watch the SOTU tonight and I am sure you will see the attempt.

Update: See the ink stained fingers? That would be the attempt...shame on them.

Election See-saw

Well, that didn't take long. As I stated in the post below, legitimacy would be the first problem to arise.

The Catch-22 of the Sunni question of legitimacy would be:

Iraq’s leading Sunni Muslim clerics said Wednesday the landmark elections lack legitimacy because large numbers of Sunnis did not participate in the balloting — which the clerics had asked them to boycott.

That is precious.

On the other side of the election playground, "Shiite Alliance Claims Victory." Supposedly, there are no concrete election results yet, so a statement in that vein seems a little premature. It seems the alliance, headed by al-Sistani, is trying to smooth the road in front of it by assuring the other groups (secular shiites, sunnis, christian kurds) that it wouldn't use it's electoral power to force the future government towards a theocracy. But, if the Shiite majority wants just that, will they be able to resist their demand?