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In Re: Padilla
A reminder about detention without trial, for US citizens arrested on US soil, unarmed, without resistance:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6682846
A reminder about detention without trial, for US citizens arrested on US soil, unarmed, without resistance:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=6682846
no subject
Date: 2007-01-03 03:19 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-01-03 04:10 pm (UTC)I don't want them to _enforce_ it, I want them to _obey_ it. Possibly to _defend_ it.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-03 05:10 pm (UTC)I doubt anything is going to change in the next two years, but it'll be interesting to see how the next administration weasels out of prosecuting GWB and his minions. I'm under no illusion that they will be prosecuted. I just hope that the next administration returns to a policy of at least pretending to obey the law.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-03 10:46 pm (UTC)However, I doubt very much that he intended to set a precedent or establish a tradition, which is what has now happened: It has now become routine for each outgoing President to pardon his predecessor, almost as a ceremonial formality, for any transgressions he may have committed. And so the situation has come about that the office of the President has no accountability, short of an actual blatantly-impeachable offense. Anything less will be forgiven when the reins of power are handed over. It's a delayed-action quid pro quo -- each incoming President pardons his predecessor, needed or not, in the expectation that he will be duly pardoned in turn by his successor for any indiscretions he might commit whiel in office.
It may have been the right thing to do in September 1974, but in 2006, it has become destructive of America and of the constitutional system of checks and balances upon American government. This new "tradition" needs to end, and end now.
no subject
Date: 2007-01-03 10:53 pm (UTC)the dirty bomb plot... uh,the apartment bomb plot... um, that is,blowing up Russian soldiers in Chechnya... uh, whatever it was we finally decide it's plausible that he might have been involved in... we'll think of something sooner or later. Honest. Trust us."