Multi Medium

A Modest Proposal On Campaign Finance Reform

Bruce Ackerman and Ian Ayres have a suggestion on how to (mostly) get around the Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision:

While Congress can’t issue a broad ban on all companies, it can target the very large class that does business with the federal government and ban those companies from “endorsing or opposing a candidate for public office.”

A 2008 Government Accountability Office study found that almost three-quarters of the largest 100 publicly traded firms are federal contractors. If Congress endorsed our proposal, these companies — and tens of thousands of others — would face a stark choice: They could endorse candidates or do business with the government, but they couldn’t do both. When push came to shove, it’s likely that very few would be willing to pay such a high price for their “free speech.”

The Roberts court is skeptical — to put it mildly — of campaign finance restrictions. But it is still highly unlikely that the justices would strike down a law targeting federal contractors. All nine recognize that Congress may restrict free speech when there is a significant risk of corruption. That risk is obvious when corporate speakers are simultaneously doing business with the government.

(…)

Our proposal requires only a modest extension of existing law. Federal contractors already are not allowed to “directly or indirectly . . . make any contribution of money or other things of value” to “any political party, committee, or candidate.” This provision arguably bars Big Pharma from launching a media campaign in favor of a candidate who supports its special deals, thereby “indirectly providing” the candidate something “of value.” But it doesn’t cover the case in which contractors threaten to spend millions to oppose senators and representatives who refuse their excessive demands. There is a need, then, for a new statutory initiative: The same anti-corruption rationale that may prohibit contractors from spending millions in favor of candidates requires a statutory prohibition on a negative advertising blitz.

IANAL (I am not a lawyer), but this sounds pretty reasonable to me.  Of course, constitutional or not, our corporate-owned Congress still has to pass it.

1 comment January 27th, 2010 at 11:26am Posted by Eli

Great Moments In Spin

Newt Gingrich explains that the Citizens United ruling is a huge win for ordinary citizens because rich people and corporations will give you millions of dollars of campaign support to oppose them. Fascinating.

BLOCK: You’re saying that this ruling affects the average citizen expressing his or her voice, as opposed to corporations being allowed to spend freely.

Mr. GINGRICH: Im saying that it allows you to have a middle-class candidate go out and find allies and supporters who are able to help them match the rich. And able to help them match the incumbent. Remember, incumbents run with millions of dollars in congressional staff, congressional franking, congressional travel. And they have all the advantages of being able to issue statements from their incumbent office. And the challenger – the person out there who’s the citizen who’s rebelling, who wants to change things – is at an enormous disadvantage in taking on incumbents.

This will, in fact, level the playing field and allow middle-class candidates to begin to have an opportunity to raise the resources to take on the powerful and the rich.

Is there a Hall Of Fame for spin?

Add comment January 23rd, 2010 at 01:26pm Posted by Eli

Wankers Of The Day

The cable industry:

This Wednesday, the cable industry’s head lobbyist gave a speech claiming that Net Neutrality would violate the First Amendment. According to the NCTA’s Kyle McSlarrow, cable companies have free speech rights, while Americans (like you) don’t have rights to access or upload content on the Internet.

And Net Neutrality — a rule that would protect Internet users from cable and phone efforts to censor you online or to discriminate against your favorite Web sites — would abridge the speech rights of phone and cable companies.

Just repeating his argument shows how silly — and offensive — it is. McSlarrow specifically said that cable companies would “speak” by offering priority-treatment to some Web sites that pay cable companies more, at the expense of other sites that don’t pay them. Really. (It’s amazing what a 2-million-dollar lobbying salary will do to a man’s reason.)

He also said two things that directly contradicted one another (nothing new for phone and cable reps). He said (1) Net Neutrality is unnecessary because cable companies would not affect Internet traffic, let alone block it; and (2) Net Neutrality is “forced speech,” because it forces cable companies to carry speech they would, in fact, otherwise block or affect.

So… in other words, Net Neutrality would infringe on the cable companies’ First Amendment right to suppress speech.  Wow.

Add comment December 11th, 2009 at 12:22pm Posted by Eli

Richard Cohen Serves Self Up A Softball, Whiffs Anyway

Because I try not to read him because he makes my brain sad, sometimes I forgot just how stupid and obtuse Richard Cohen is.  In yesterday’s column, he manages to come up with a very valid thesis (Obama has lost his moral clarity and betrayed the ideals he professed on the campaign trail) and then does an incredibly awful job of backing it up:

Somehow, though, that moral clarity has dissipated. The Obama who was leading a movement of professed political purity is the very same person who as president would not meet with the Dalai Lama, lest he annoy the very sensitive Chinese. He is the same man who bowed to the emperor of Japan when, in my estimation, the president of the United States should bow to no man. He is the same president who in China played the mannequin for the Chinese government, appearing at stage-managed news conferences and events — and having his remarks sometimes censored. When I saw him in that picture alone on the Great Wall, he seemed to be thinking, “What the hell am I doing here?” If so, it was a good question.

The Barack Obama of that Philadelphia speech would not have let his attorney general, Eric Holder, announce the new policy for trying Khalid Sheik Mohammed and four other Sept. 11 defendants in criminal court, as if this were a mere departmental issue and not one of momentous policy. And the Barack Obama of the speech would have enunciated a principle of law and not an ad hoc system in which some alleged terrorists are tried in civilian courts and some before military tribunals. What is the principle in that: What works, works? Try putting that one on the Liberty Bell.

Of course, there’s a difference between campaigning and governing. There is no reality to campaigning. You want Guantanamo closed, you say you’ll close it. You want to close it as president, and all of a sudden it becomes a political crisis that costs you your White House counsel, an experienced and principled man named Gregory Craig. Governing is hard.

Okay, he’s right about the Dalai Lama and Gitmo, but The Bow? (It’s a sign of respect not submission, you pinhead)  Getting China on board with reducing carbon emissions?  Trying KSM in a civilian court?  These are supposed examples of Obama losing his moral clarity?  How about his continuation of Bush’s policies of secrecy and executive power?  His doubling down on Afghanistan?  His unconcern for the public option?  His serial betrayals of the gay community?

It’s a pretty easy case to make, and Cohen still can’t do it effectively.  Why a major American newspaper would pay him to write this inept drivel, I have no idea.

Add comment November 25th, 2009 at 07:16am Posted by Eli

What’s The Opposite Of Defamation?

And can you really sue for it?

The U.S. Chamber of Commerce filed a civil complaint on Monday against members of a liberal activist group who staged a news conference to falsely announce that the 3 million-member business federation had reversed its stance on climate change legislation.

(…)

As part of its hoax on Oct. 19, Yes Men announced at the National Press Club that the chamber would stop lobbying against the Senate’s 800-page climate bill. Reuters moved a story based on the false press release, and both CNBC and Fox Business Network reported it – with the anchors correcting themselves mid-story upon learning it was false.

I know, the lawsuit is more about trademark violation, but I think it’s hilarious and a little surreal that the Chamber is suing the Yes Men for trying to make them look like they weren’t complete amoral assholes for one day.

Add comment October 27th, 2009 at 09:35pm Posted by Eli

That’s Not A Ham Sandwich!

Here’s a creative workaround to the statute of limitations…

Nearly 10 years had passed since a college student was raped on the Upper West Side of Manhattan, and with no known suspect in the 1993 case, the police were not close to an arrest. But what they did have was nearly as critical: the rapist’s DNA profile.

Prosecutors in Manhattan — aware that the legal clock for bringing a case was running out — devised the novel strategy of indicting the rapist’s DNA. Four years later, the sample was connected to a man, Victor Rondon; he was eventually convicted and sentenced to 44 to 107 years in prison.

While there have been many celebrated cases in which DNA evidence has been used to overturn wrongful convictions, often many years after the trial, such evidence has become essential in solving cold cases.

In New York City, prosecutors have secured 117 indictments of DNA samples in rape cases, linked 18 of those profiles to specific people, and obtained 13 convictions, either through trials or negotiated pleas. Five cases are pending.

“What we said was, ‘There is no reason for people to get away with rape because of the statute of limitations,’ ” said John Feinblatt, Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg’s criminal justice coordinator. “They shouldn’t be able to hide behind it; they shouldn’t be able to race for time and get over the finish line and leave a victim without a case being solved.”

Sounds good to me.  I’m not a big fan of the statute of limitations concept – if there are extenuating circumstances like hazy witness memory or the suspect’s subsequent upstandingness, then bring them up during trial.

Add comment October 19th, 2009 at 07:25pm Posted by Eli

Great Moments In American History

It’s a shame, but these things happen.

(From Married To The Sea)

Add comment October 8th, 2009 at 11:16am Posted by Eli

Wanker Of The Month

Shorter Broderella: Rule of law is too partisan.

First, let me stipulate that I agree on the importance of accountability for illegal acts and for serious breaches of trust by government officials — even at the highest levels. I had no problem with the impeachment proceedings against Richard Nixon, and I called for Bill Clinton to resign when he lied to his Cabinet colleagues and to the country during the Monica Lewinsky scandal.

(…)

I am not persuaded by former vice president Dick Cheney’s argument that this is simply political revenge by the now-dominant Democrats against their Republican predecessors. For all the previously stated reasons, there is ample justification for seeking answers apart from any partisan motive.

Nonetheless, I think it is a matter of regret that Holder asked prosecutor John H. Durham to review the cases of the agents accused of abusive tactics toward some captives.

I realize this is a preliminary investigation, not a decision to prosecute anyone. And if it were to stop at that point, no great harm would have been done. But it is the first step on a legal trail that could lead to trials — and that is what gives me pause.

Cheney is not wrong when he asserts that it is a dangerous precedent when a change in power in Washington leads a successor government not just to change the policies of its predecessors but to invoke the criminal justice system against them.

Not investigating or prosecuting war crimes is kind of a dangerous precedent, too…

Looming beyond the publicized cases of these relatively low-level operatives is the fundamental accountability question: What about those who approved of their actions? If accountability is the standard, then it should apply to the policymakers and not just to the underlings. Ultimately, do we want to see Cheney, who backed these actions and still does, standing in the dock?

Well yes.

In times like these, the understandable desire to enforce individual accountability must be weighed against the consequences. This country is facing so many huge challenges at home and abroad that the president cannot afford to be drawn into what would undoubtedly be a major, bitter partisan battle over prosecution of Bush-era officials. The cost to the country would simply be too great.

Accountability is just too hard and it’ll make the Republicans upset, so why bother.  Now, a witch hunt against a Democratic president for getting a blow job, that’s okay.

When President Ford pardoned Nixon in 1974, I wrote one of the few columns endorsing his decision, which was made on the basis that it was more important for America to focus on the task of changing the way it would be governed and addressing the current problems. It took a full generation for the decision to be recognized by the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation and others as the act of courage that it had been.

Awesome.  Can you imagine what kind of mess this country would be in if Nixon had been held accountable instead of getting off scot free and allowed to rehabilitate his image as a statesman?  Why, it might even have discredited anyone who worked in his administration, and I don’t know if our country could afford such a terrible loss.

Add comment September 3rd, 2009 at 07:21am Posted by Eli

Jerry Nadler Also Speaks For Me

…By stating the bloody obvious:

Former Vice President Cheney is essentially saying that any acts performed by members of the CIA – no matter how illegal or abhorrent – are ok, and must never be the subject of a criminal investigation. No matter what anyone in the CIA may do, it need not be subject to the law. This is outrageous, and violates just about every traditional American concept of liberty and justice.

It is remarkable that this even needed to be said. And depressing that it is seen as some kind of leftist fringe position.

Add comment August 31st, 2009 at 11:05pm Posted by Eli

When America Does It, It’s Not Illegal

Shorter Cheney: Laws are for the weak.

A CIA inspector general’s report released Monday documented how interrogators menaced “high-value” detainees with a gun and a power drill, threatened their families and used other methods that went beyond even the permissive interrogation rules set by the Bush administration Justice Department.

Cheney, who strongly opposes the Obama administration’s new probe into alleged detainee abuse, was asked in the Fox News interview whether he was “OK” with interrogations that went beyond Justice’s specific legal authorization.

“I am,” the former vice president replied.

“My sort of overwhelming view is that the enhanced interrogation techniques were absolutely essential in saving thousands of American lives and preventing further attacks,” he said. “It was good policy. It was properly carried out. It worked very, very well.”

In other words, the ends justify the means, even when the means have nothing to do with achieving them.

Add comment August 29th, 2009 at 12:55pm Posted by Eli

Oh My God, They Killed Irony! You Bastards!

Between teabaggers lamenting the infringement of their 1st Amendment rights and conservatives in general talking up Obama’s fascist police state, it seems like irony gets killed every single day.  Today’s executioner is Paul Broun:

The Athens Banner-Herald reports today that Rep. Paul Broun (R-GA) told constituents yesterday that he thinks Democratic leaders are planning to declare martial law:

He also spoke of a “socialistic elite” – Obama, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid – who might use a pandemic disease or natural disaster as an excuse to declare martial law.

“They’re trying to develop an environment where they can take over,” he said. “We’ve seen that historically.”

The right’s newfound concern for the Constitution and civil liberties is admirable, but several years too late.

Add comment August 12th, 2009 at 09:54pm Posted by Eli

Judicial Activism = Absence Of Conservative Judicial Activism

That’s really the only consistent definition that I can see in the Republicans’ usage of the term.  John McCain is the latest offender:

One day after he warned that Republicans have a “very, very deep hole that we’ve got to come out of” with Latino voters, Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) announced that he would oppose the first Latina nominated to the nation’s highest court. Moreover, in his statement opposing Judge Sonia Sotomayor, McCain misrepresents his own record on judges:

Again and again, Judge Sotomayor seeks to amend the law to fit the circumstances of the case, thereby substituting herself in the role of a legislator. … To protect the equal, but separate roles of all three branches of government, I cannot support activist judges that seek to legislate from the bench. I have not supported such nominees in the past, and I cannot support such a nominee to the highest court in the land.

Despite his claim that he has never supported a judge who “seeks to amend the law to fit the circumstances of the case,” McCain voted in favor of Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito; and he described both Roberts and Alito as “model judges” during the 2008 campaign….

[Insert Roberts, Alito, and Thomas' greatest hits here]

As a Yale Law School study published before Roberts and Alito joined the Supreme Court determined, Justice Thomas is the one justice who is most likely to vote to invalidate an Act of Congress — doing so a massive 65.63% of the time. The Court’s two Clinton appointees, Justices Ginsburg and Breyer, are the least likely to second-guess Congress.  So McCain has no problem with judges who “substitute [them]self in the role of a legislator;” he’s just upset that Sotomayor won’t push the same right-wing agenda as his favorite justices.

“Judicial activism” is transparently dishonest garbage, but I predict that Republicans will continue using it as an excuse to vote against moderate and progressive judges until roughly the end of time.

Add comment August 3rd, 2009 at 07:36pm Posted by Eli

Cargo Cult Democracy

There was a great letter in yesterday’s NYT, lamenting just how far American democracy has fallen:

Six moderate/conservative senators from the smallest states will dictate the terms of health care reform, or whether there will be reform, to the rest of the American populace.

These senators oppose single-payer, even a public option, and are obsessed with the “cost” argument. Polls, however, consistently indicate that an overwhelming majority of Americans want either single-payer or a public option and are not so concerned with the cost if health care is delivered.

An even larger majority wants major, fundamental health care reform.

We tout our “democracy” throughout the world, and at every election cycle its praises are sung, yet a handful of senators acting outside the mainstream, apparently in line with their small constituencies, can thwart the will of the vast majority of Americans, denying in the process, or limiting, a fundamental right of all: a healthy life.

The only part of that last paragraph that I would quibble with is the assumption that these six senators’ rural constituencies are as stubbornly opposed to the public option as they are.

But I’m more interested in the larger point: We brag about how great our democracy is, we use it as an excuse to do whatever we want overseas because it’s in the service of our fantastic democracy and sharing its wonders with the rest of the world, but the truth is that we are a democracy in name only.  Like the Pacific cargo cultists, we build the structures and follow the routines of democracy, but the actual democracy is long gone.

We hold free and fair elections, wherein we vote for the candidates who spend the most money and package themselves in the most compelling way and get the most flattering media coverage, with substantive policy hardly a factor at all.  Or we vote for the candidate whose district has been gerrymandered to ensure that the same party wins all the time, no matter how badly it performs.  Or our votes are nullified by dodgy electronic voting machines or suppressed through fraud and  intimidation.

We elect presidents and congressmen to represent our interests, who instead do the bidding of the corporations who gave them the money to buy our votes.

We have a code of laws and a brilliant, enduring Constitution, but our presidents and judges ignore and distort them when it suits their purposes.  And if the president gets caught, Congress just ignores it, flails impotently, or makes it retroactively legal.

That’s not democracy; we’re just going through the motions.  Real democracy would mean real accountability, which would mean a lot less security for those in power.  But as long as we have a political system which ignores the masses and rewards selfishness and amorality in the ruling elite, it’s hard to see where reform is going to come from.  It’s a catch-22, really – the system is designed to produce a neverending supply of exactly the kind of politicians who will fight to the death to preserve it.

Add comment August 1st, 2009 at 02:28pm Posted by Eli

What. I’ve. Been. Saying. (Again)

Almost four years ago, I observed that “Bush’s claim that he had to take extraordinary measures to fight terror is at odds with his resolute unwillingness to take ordinary measures against terror.”  Apparently the intel inspectors general agree with me:

We’ve known for years that the Bush administration ignored and broke the law repeatedly in the name of national security. It is now clear that many of those programs could have been conducted just as easily within the law — perhaps more effectively and certainly with far less damage to the justice system and to Americans’ faith in their government.

That is the inescapable conclusion from a devastating report by the inspectors general of the intelligence and law-enforcement community on President George W. Bush’s warrantless wiretapping program. The report shows that the longstanding requirement that the government obtain a warrant was not hindering efforts to gather intelligence on terrorists after the 9/11 attacks. In fact, the argument that the law was an impediment was concocted by White House and Justice Department lawyers after Mr. Bush authorized spying on Americans’ international communications.

(…)

So why break the law, again and again? Two things seem disturbingly clear. First, President Bush and his top aides panicked after the Sept. 11 attacks. And second, Mr. Cheney and his ideologues, who had long chafed at any legal constraints on executive power, preyed on that panic to advance their agenda.

It is absolutely criminal that these people are not being treated as criminals.

Add comment July 17th, 2009 at 09:35am Posted by Eli

Legal Fail

Okay, I am admittedly not a law-talking expert, but I’m pretty sure it doesn’t work this way…

Sen. Jeff Sessions of Alabama, the ranking Republican on the Judiciary Committee, asked if she would recuse herself from future gun control cases because she ruled in the past that the right to bear arms under the Second Amendment does not apply to state gun control laws.

Can anyone see where justices recusing themselves from cases involving issues where they had previously ruled might potentially cause some problems?

Add comment July 17th, 2009 at 08:12am Posted by Eli

People Unclear On The Concept

John McCain and David Gregory:

MR. GREGORY:  Should there be an investigation, do you think?

SEN. McCAIN:  I don’t know if–first of all, I’d like to know the facts of the case before there should be an, “an investigation.”

MR. GREGORY:  Mm-hmm.

Um.

Add comment July 14th, 2009 at 10:05am Posted by Eli

The Most Important Legislation EVAR!

According to Joe Lieberman and his BFF Lindsey Graham, there is no higher legislative priority than ensuring that photographic evidence of war crimes never sees the light of day.

It is so heartwarming to see someone standing up for the torturers.  Truly, they are an inspiration to us all.

Add comment June 9th, 2009 at 09:18pm Posted by Eli

Not The Ethical Reprimand!

Liz Cheney helpfully explains that it’s not torture that’s the real crime, it’s calling torture torture that’s the real crime:

I hear an awful lot of people out there throwing words around like “torture” and “lines being crossed,” and i think it’s a really, you know, it’s…  it’s irresponsible and frankly it’s libelous because you have got brave Americans, men and women, who were involved in this program at the C.I.A who were involved in making sure that the program didn’t cross any lines at the Justice Department.  Those people were responsible for saving American lives and keeping us safe.  And I think it is offensive for all Americans for this White House to suggest that somehow those actions deserve prosecution or… or… ya-know some sort of ya-know ethical reprimand.

An ethical reprimand?  Good heavens, what kind of inhuman monster does she think Obama is?  First it’s ethical reprimands, and then the next thing you know it’ll be sternly worded letters.  The very fabric of this country could unravel in the face of such extreme sanctions!

Add comment May 29th, 2009 at 11:24am Posted by Eli

A Tincture Of Hypocrisy

No Republican who was not calling for Bush’s resignation or impeachment over the last three years of his term has any right to say this:

The Obama administration is bold. It also is careless regarding constitutional values and is acquiring a tincture of lawlessness.

George Will is kidding, right?  Please tell me he’s kidding and didn’t just rediscover his hunger for “constitutional values” and the rule of law when Obama put his hand on Abe Lincoln’s Bible.

Add comment May 14th, 2009 at 11:34pm Posted by Eli

A Modest Proposal

So, as I understand it, the Voting Rights Act may be in trouble:

[T]he Voting Rights Act… among other things, requires a federal judge or the Department of Justice to “pre-clear” any changes to voting procedures in parts of the country that have a history of excluding voters on the basis of race.  White racists who try to exclude minorities as minorities have to justify their decision to do so, and their plans are frequently thwarted by the good folks in the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division.

If early reports from yesterday’s oral arguments in the Supreme Court are accurate, however, that may soon be changing.  Apparently, the five conservative justices are upset that the Voting Rights Act singles out a handful of largely southern states, while allowing states like Michigan and California to escape supervision under the pre-clearance provisions—so they look ready to strike the whole thing down.

If the problem is that southern states are being singled out when there are racists everywhere, how is that an argument for eliminating the VRA entirely?  If the conservative justices are so worried that northern racists are getting away with murder, then why not simply expand the pre-clearance requirement to all states?  I mean, their objective is to eliminate racially discriminatory election laws, right?

Right?

5 comments April 30th, 2009 at 10:56pm Posted by Eli

When The Nazis Do It, It’s Not Illegal

Wow, Condi sure had an eventful Monday at Stanford…

• Called al Qaeda a bigger threat than the Nazis because “Nazi Germany never attacked the homeland of the United States.”

• Said that “if it was authorized by the president, it did not violate our obligations under the Convention Against Torture”  In other words, when the president does it, it’s not illegal.

• Speaking of which, she apparently fingered Dubya for authorizing torture.

Awesome.  A few more visits back to Stanford and she’ll have a legacy to rival Dick Cheney’s, and her “husband” will be in prison.

1 comment April 30th, 2009 at 09:30pm Posted by Eli

The Law And The Government Are Supposed To Be On The Same Side

Yet another example of why the Bush administration was morally and ethically repulsive:

Karen Greenberg’s book, Least Worst Place, gives us a very compelling answer. It’s found in a passage in which Will Taft (who emerges from all of this as a minor hero who genuinely believes the values that he articulates) relays a discussion he had with John Yoo. He didn’t understand why there was such ferocious pushback against the Geneva Conventions–why not just accept and live with these standards? America had done so for fifty years. The room got quiet, and Yoo said, “We have an Article 17 problem.”

That was a key point. Article 17 says, “No physical or mental torture, nor any other form of coercion, may be inflicted on prisoners of war,” and John Yoo and the others did not want to have to agree to that. Taft understood what was going on, and he fought back. The State Department team wrote a memo calling Yoo’s opinion “seriously flawed” and “fundamentally inaccurate.” They were saying that John Yoo’s lawyering was incompetent.

But we learn from Greenberg’s book that there was a point to all of this. Yoo’s analysis of the law was dishonest. It was driven by a need to get a certain result–to introduce a system of torture of the prisoners. He was intent on twisting the law to get all the restrictions out of the way.

Good-faith opinion writing? I think not.

The whole purpose of the OLC is to tell the administration what it legally can and cannot do, not act like a mob lawyer finding loopholes or concocting bogus rationales for whatever sordid things the boss wants to do.  If (I repeat, IF) we still had functioning mechanisms for accountability, Yoo and Bybee’s legal malpractice would have exposed Bush and his inner circle to the risk of some serious jailtime.

The OLC is supposed to rein in the administration’s criminal impulses, not enable them.

Add comment April 30th, 2009 at 05:53pm Posted by Eli

I Can’t Believe It’s Not Accountability

Cory Doctorow is talking about something completely different (police brutality in the UK), but his central argument is eerily applicable to the situation here in the US:

Transparency means nothing unless it is accompanied by the rule of law. It means nothing unless it is set in a system of good and responsible government, of oversight of authority that expeditiously and effectively handles citizen complaints. Transparency means nothing without justice.

(…)

Transparency on its own is nothing more than spectacle: it’s just another season of Big Brother in which all the contestants are revealed, over and over again, as thugs. Transparency on its own robs as much hope as it delivers, because transparency without justice is a perennial reminder that the game is rigged and that those in power govern for power’s sake, not for justice.

Sure, it’s great that Obama’s DOJ released all those torture memos, but it’s terribly demoralizing when he continues to show pretty much zero interest in pursuing investigations and prosecutions even after the depth of BushCo’s depravity has been exposed.

Sure, he may yet bow to pressure, or Holder may choose to do the right thing, but enforcing the law and protecting the Constitution is not something that our government should have to be forced into kicking and screaming.  I mean, it’s kind of their job, after all.

Add comment April 29th, 2009 at 08:54pm Posted by Eli

Quote Of The Day

From John Yoo’s Dickipedia entry:

Having devoted his life to the common dick practice of redefining words to mean something different and more convenient, Yoo, during the course of one business day, redefined “acceptable behavior for a civilized nation” to “pretty much anything up to the reenactment of an Eli Roth movie.”

That. Is. Perfect.

(h/t watertiger)

Add comment April 27th, 2009 at 09:20pm Posted by Eli

Catch Of The Day

Turns out even Ronald Reagan’s DOJ thought waterboarding was illegal.

During the Reagan Administration, the Department of Justice prosecuted a Texas sheriff and three deputies for waterboarding suspects to obtain confessions, and won convictions. The sheriff was sentenced to 10 years in prison, and the deputies to 4 years.

So, conservatives… if Ronald Reagan is infallible… and he was anti-waterboarding…

You can’t even argue that waterboarding is okay for obtaining intel but not confessions.

Add comment April 27th, 2009 at 08:18pm Posted by Eli

So What?

So Gallup is doing another poll on whether or not the American public supports criminal investigations of the Bush administration’s justification and use of torture.

But should it really matter?  I mean, since when should public opinion determine whether the rule of law gets upheld, whether criminals get held accountable?

And conversely, how dare conservatives and concern trolls like Broder proclaim that any investigations or prosecutions would be politically motivated?  If they’re so confident that the Bush administration did nothing illegal, shouldn’t they welcome the chance to clear their names?  And if they’re not so confident, are they once again admitting that they place partisan loyalty above respect for the law?

Add comment April 26th, 2009 at 02:26pm Posted by Eli

Wanker Of The Day

Shorter David Frum: Prosecuting criminal politicians = criminalizing politics.

Apparently it is inconceivable to conservatives that:

A) The Bush administration’s activities were illegal, and

B) That illegal (Republican) activities should ever be investigated or prosecuted.

I especially liked the part where he warned about the possibility of reprisals by Republicans.  Because Republicans never indulge in trumped-up politically-motivated prosecutions.

(h/t Phoenix Woman)

Add comment April 24th, 2009 at 07:21am Posted by Eli

Democracy 101

Accountability = Democracy.  Impunity = Not Democracy.

So, stories over the last few years, all coming together over the last few days, unambiguously tell us that the highest officials of the US Government ordered the commission of war crimes, in order to obtain false information to justify an even more egregious crime of waging an unnecessary, aggressive war in which innocent people are still being killed. But when the opposition party takes over, the official response is that the US government cannot hold a single person legally accountable.

At the same time, Wall Street banksters have just devastated the US economy and world economy, causing billions of people untold economic suffering that will last (even worsen) for years, and not a single bankster has been held legally accountable. Most are still in their enriched executive positions, demanding the terms under which the government will continue to prop them up, as they successfully lobby Congress to weaken every piece of consumer protection or meaningful oversight.

You stand back and look at this, and it’s hard not to see it as a massive “systemic” failure of the US governance system. The principle of accountability, notions of fairness and justice, and the simple concept that no one is about the law — sorry, but these are all in freefall, and almost none of our “democratic” leaders seem to give a damn.

If laws are not enforced, or are only enforced for the little people, then they have no value, and the people who control our government have no incentive to obey the law or look out for anyone’s interests but their own.

It looks like we’re officially there.

Add comment April 23rd, 2009 at 09:03pm Posted by Eli

Co-Wanker Of The Day, Part III

I know, right? So many wankers, so little time.

Shorter Wingnut Law Center: ZOMG Obama wants to take away our veterans’ constitutional right to join hate groups and kill people!

Add comment April 20th, 2009 at 08:50pm Posted by Eli

Tinfoil Vindication?

To me, one of the least convincing explanations for the Democrats’ fecklessness during the past 7 years was that the Bush administration was using NSA wiretaps to blackmail them.  I always thought that sounded farfetched and paranoid, but now I’m not so sure:

Rep. Jane Harman, the California Democrat with a longtime involvement in intelligence issues, was overheard on an NSA wiretap telling a suspected Israeli agent that she would lobby the Justice Department reduce espionage-related charges against two officials of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, the most powerful pro-Israel organization in Washington.

Harman was recorded saying she would “waddle into” the AIPAC case “if you think it’ll make a difference,” according to two former senior national security officials familiar with the NSA transcript.

In exchange for Harman’s help, the sources said, the suspected Israeli agent pledged to help lobby Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., then-House minority leader, to appoint Harman chair of the Intelligence Committee after the 2006 elections, which the Democrats were heavily favored to win.

Seemingly wary of what she had just agreed to, according to an official who read the NSA transcript, Harman hung up after saying, “This conversation doesn’t exist.”

(…)

[C]ontrary to reports that the Harman investigation was dropped for “lack of evidence,” it was Alberto R. Gonzales, President Bush’s top counsel and then attorney general, who intervened to stop the Harman probe.

Why? Because, according to three top former national security officials, Gonzales wanted Harman to be able to help defend the administration’s warrantless wiretapping program, which was about break in The New York Times and engulf the White House.

Holy crap.  That sure sounds like blackmail to me – unless it means Harman was already in the tank for the Bush administration and they were just trying to protect one of their own.  Which is not exactly encouraging either.

Either way, this damn well better cost Harman her seat.

Add comment April 20th, 2009 at 07:17am Posted by Eli