Thursday, June 22, 2006
The War and the Law
The debate continues about the Iraq War on Capital Hill. The war has dragged on for three years. Now a majority of people want to withdraw, but republicans dismiss this as a “cut and run” strategy. Remind me again, republicans, who is paying for this war, you or us?
More info on global warming, as if 900+ peer-reviewed scientific studies isn’t enough: this time from the National Center for Atmospheric Research.
Regarding the NSA wiretapping scandal, there have been several not-so-momentous developments, which Glenn Greenwald covers well. I highly recommend you visit his website.
The pace of these developments is akin to the pace of watching grass grow. The president has admitted to violating FISA and ordering thousands of wiretaps without warrants, maintaining that FISA is unconstitutional. Of course, he has no more authority to rule a law unconstitutional than I do: that is the job of the courts, and ultimately the Supreme Court, if they choose to do so. If memory serves, what usually happens when a person breaks a law in this country is that person is arrested, brought up on charges, maybe released on bail, and then the court date is set to examine and judge the claims of the defendant as to whether or not their lawbreaking was justified. Of course, if that person happens to be the president of the United States, that person is apparently above the process of the law.
Way back in March of 2004 NBC discovered that the president and the National Security Council had nixed multiple Pentagon plans to attack Abu Musab Zarqawi because “the administration feared destroying the terrorist camp in Iraq could undercut its case for war against Saddam.” Allegations of the president playing politics with the War on Terror, sadly enough, are hardly new. Although this is old news, I think we need to be reminded of this as Congress debates the war in terms of 9/11, as the Justice Department brings a case against Jose Padilla (an American citizen) 3.5 years after they detained him without charges, right before the Supreme Court was set to rule on his detentions by all indications, against the administration.
# posted by BitterHarvest @ 5:24 PM 
