We finally have some checks on Presidential power. Thank goodness for that. But as Greenwald points out, Congress can undo everything the court did. So you know what to do in November.
Thursday, June 29, 2006
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| Bell Curve | The Law Talking Guy | Raised by Republicans | U.S. West | ||||||||||
| Well, he's kind of had it in for me ever since I accidentally ran over his dog. Actually, replace "accidentally" with "repeatedly," and replace "dog" with "son." | |||||||||||||
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10 comments:
I'm not sure I agree with Greenwald. I believe the Court's majority (5) insisted that Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions had to apply, because of a Congressional mandate. It left for another day the larger questions of how far Congressional power went in these areas. Notably, it did not reach any significant constitutional issues about due process - it decided the issue on separation of powers grounds.
// posted by LTG
I've heard commentators on NPR and PBS go back and forth on this issue of whether the ruling applies the Geneva Convention or not.
I think the major component of the ruling is that it (again) undermines Bush's broad claims of executive discretion in wartime. Regardless of what the details are, the punch line is "No Mr. President, you may not do this unilaterally under presumed powers from Article II."
// posted by Raised By Republicans
Not that we ever thought Clarence Thomas had any shame ...but this is jaw dropping!
// posted by Raised By Republicans
Thomas is a disgrace to the bench.
// posted by USWest
Clarence Thomas' opinion is just shocking. It can be summed up as follows: if the President says we are at war, he has unlimited power until he says the war is over. Thomas does not even date the "war" on terror from 9/11 or the act of Congress giving the President authority, but from some time in 1996 when Bin Laden first made statements "declaring war on the United States." In violation of Article I, Thomas would altogether remove from Congress the power to declare war.
He also extols the virtue of the powerful unified executive in confronting crises, because it is able to act swiftly, decisively, etc.
Every American should read Thomas' opinion to understand what modern American fascism is.
Thomas must be impeached.
// posted by LTG
The best thing about Stevens' opinion is that he raises up the humanity of Yasir Hamdan. Although this man has been held incommunicado 10,000 miles from home and tortured by a government that declares him "the worst of the worst," Stevens' opinion implicitly recognizes that Hamdan deserves to be accorded the same dignity of every human being.
Stevens almost goes out of his way, in my opinion, to speak of Hamdan as a person. When Stevens writes "The govenrment says X, but Hamdan argues Y. Hamdan has the better of the argument," it is like the world turning on its head. Stevens does not refer to him as a terrorist untermensch.
This is what most likely galls the conservatives on the court the most, that Stevens actually gives Hamdan his day in court, as a human being. It is, in its own way, ennobling to read. *This* is what separates us from the jihadists. One cannot imagine Al Zawahiri issuing a discussion about the rights of one of his captives.
I am also reminded of Johnson v. M'Intosh (1823), where the Supreme Court considered the rights of Indians to their land. It concluded sourly, "Conquest gives a title which the courts of the conqueror cannot deny, whatever the private and speculative opinions of individuals may be, respecting the original justice of the claim which has been successfully asserted." Even while denying the Indian's claim, it nonetheless acknowledges his humanity. Conquest, not natural law of white supremacy, was the agent of dispossession.
Is Thomas really a believer or is he so intellecutally unfit for the task at hand that he follows? He just wrote his first dissent after being on the Court for 15 years. Strikes me as a poser.
// posted by USWest
I think Thomas, Alito and Roberts were all picked more their ideological positions than their intelligence or wisdom as judges.
For all the talk about how Roberts was a fair conservative, I thought the reports of his rulings showed a stark ideological and class bias regardless of the legal merits of any case before him. This is how the Post-Nixon GOP works.
// posted by Raised By Republicans
I don't think it's Thomas' first dissent.
// posted by LTG
It appears that it isn't his first. I was repeating a claim I heard on a news report somewhere. So either I missed a nuance or they were flat out wrong. That will teach me.
// posted by US West
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