From BoingBoing:

http://www.boingboing.net/2006/10/17...bill_sign.html

This is not why I was in the military, this is not what I fought for, this is not what this country is about.

Tomas

 

won't the Judical Branch label this as constitutional and get rid of it?


what the hell are these Checks and Balances for??!!

 

For SCOTUS (Supreme Court of the United States) to ge involved, someone has to take the Federal Government to court about the individual effects of this law.

That 'someone' will not be the US DOJ, since that is a part of the Executive Branch (they report to the President), it won't be the Legislative Branch - they are the ones who passed the bill for him to sign, and it can't be the Judicial Branch, they only decide cases, not start them.

That means someone outside the federal government has to stand up on their hind legs and sue the government. To do that, it has to be a person actually directly affected by this law, or they don't have standing to bring the case.

There is a pretty limited list of folks with an actual ability to do that.

It will happen, this will end up in court, but it may be a while and it won't be easy.

====

For other reporting from around the world...

Google News Search on this subject.

Tomas

 

First of all it amazes me how much we have changed since 9-11. The few weeks afterword everyone was screaming about how it could have been stopped and everyone would have been for this. Now its back to all that human rights for everyone BS. I'm sorry but if strapping jumper cables to Abdual's ********* saves even one American's life I say hook em up. I know how brainwashed this country is in thinking that Bush and Cheny are pure evil but come on its not like there going to touture an American citizen over a stolen candy bar. This is for people with ties to terrorists, which of course isn't mentioned in the article that you posted, and why would it be since the article is clearly biased. Really who's side are you people on?

 

Please keep in mind that just because someone is grabbed by the authorities, does not mean they are guilty of anything, and this includes folks that have been arrested for alleged terrorist involvement.

Just one example of that should be more than enough to show that it does happen, and that is what these protections have always been about - protecting those who are innocent.

Want an example, read up on the Portland, OR lawyer who was whisked away, business shut down, house and business destructively searched, family and friends harassed and reputation destroyed because the FBI can't properly match fingerprints and he was thought to have his fingerprints all over the terrorist bombs that destroyed a train in Spain - even though he had nothing to do with it and had never been to Spain.

Next time it could be you or me grabbed by a bunch of guys with no sense of humor, stuffed into a cell and kept from contacting anyone while they turn your testis in to Christmas lights, tear apart everything you own, and terrorize your friends and family because some guy at a desk in Washington made an error.

When they make those errors, you usually don't even get so much as an apology.

Remember, even those folks at Guantonimo are not all guilty - about a quarter of them have been released as not being "enemy combatants" after being held for years.

In any case, disregarding any of what I just wrote, if they had to pass a new law making it legal to do things that were not legal before, this is obviously a change in the way things are being done when compared to they way we were doing them.

It used to be illegal to arrest someone, hold them without allowing them to contact anyone, and torture them until they admitted to something. The United States didn't work that way. That stuff only happened in those evil places we didn't like.

Now, that is officially how the United States works. It has just become law.

I've been on the point of the spear, I've been the guy swapping muzzle flashes with the enemy in the dark, I've fought to preserve the liberties and freedoms of all of us, and this is NOT what I was fighting for.

Taking shortcuts around the freedoms, liberties, and protections we all used to share does not make us safer, but the opposite.

(This 'discussion' will, of course, deteriorate rapidly over time, and when it does I will lock it and possibly remove it. It probably doesn't belong here, anyway. I should have just kept this to my blog.)

Tomas

 

You misinterpret us. We're not un-American. We aren't all touchy-feely about everyone, we're not pansies who think it's ok that terrorists do to our country and citizens what they want. We are the people who realize that not every person detained is guilty of what they are accused of, and that the percentage is not even close to 100%. If we were positive beyond a shadow of a doubt of guilt, then hell, of course I'll support a little off-the-books punishment, as long as its appropriate. But when we do that without being positive- that is the fundamental error. We begin to torture innocent people, destroying relations with foreign nations and their citizens' opinions of us. We have handed control of who to torture to a circus of fools, and they possess now the ability to thoroughly abuse it.

 

(Does anyone who is a fan of the movie "Brazil" feel more and more a sense of deja vu? Buttle/Tuttle errors and all. Should Homeland Security be able to tell the difference between a six year old blond girl from middle America and an Al-Quaida operative? They can't.)

Tomas

 

this why i am no longer in the military and got seperated early. there's too much BS along with politics that are just yea... wrong.

 

Let me ask this question then, what is worse touturing someone who is wrongfully accused or not tourturing a terrorist and therefore not getting the information that causes another terrorist attack?

 

Ah! We have our first volunteer!

Tomas

 

oh boy......

 

First, what if that were you or someone you knew that was wrongfully accused, would that change your mind?

Second, the most experienced interagators refuse to buy into the relevancy of information obtained by torture. You more likely to get erronious information that the torturers want to hear than you are to get anything of relevance.

Third, instead of wasting resources on torture, we need to be developing solid intel. The torture and the war together are helping the recruiting efforts of the wrong side and hurting the efforts of the right side. Our strategy is flawed, and a few more years of this b/s is going to get the US into an irreversable situation.