Human Rights

Clifford Johnson

Clifford Johnson — Mon, 02 Nov 2009 23:10:14 -0800

The Speech I Hope the President Will Give

Alan Jenkins — Mon, 07 Sep 2009 20:31:40 -0700

My Fellow Americans:

I speak to you tonight at a crucial moment in our nation’s history. When you elected me president almost one year ago, you voted in favor of hope, and in favor of change. You voted for the idea that we are all in it together, and that we share a common responsibility to uphold the public good. You rejected the old politics of special interests, of legislative gridlock, and the failed notion that you’re better off on your own than as part of one indivisible nation.

You called out—in veterans’ halls and in union halls, in congregations and from small businesses, in senior centers and on college campuses—that this is America and, in America, we can fix what’s broken, and we can do it together.

Tonight our nation faces a crucial test of that profoundly American resolve. Will we rise together and ensure the basic security for our people that comes from affordable, quality health insurance? Or will we allow the cynics and the fear mongers, and the entrenched interests to extinguish that hope? Can we transcend the partisan bickering and solve the biggest problems facing our nation? Can we be the country we were meant to be?

Tonight, my fellow Americans, I come to you with a clear answer to that question: Yes We Can.

We will reform our health insurance system this year. And we will reform it with one core value at its center: that health care is a basic human right, as essential to leading a productive and fulfilling life as food and shelter. It is not a consumer good. It is not a luxury. It is a public good and a human right. No one in our great nation should have to go without that human right. And starting this year, 2009, no one will.

Protecting the human right to health care is not only about those who cannot afford health insurance, or those whose insurance does not cover their actual health needs. It is not only about the elderly among us, or the sick, or about our vulnerable children and youth. It is about all of us.

When workers cannot afford the care they need, our entire nation’s prosperity suffers. When businesses that do offer coverage are crippled by spiraling costs, our entire nation’s competitiveness is in jeopardy. When half of all personal bankruptcies are due to health care related debts, our entire nation’s economic security is enfeebled. When parents cannot afford to take their children to the doctor, our entire nation’s future is at risk. And when 22,000 Americans die, as they will again this year, solely because they lack health insurance, we are failing to be the country we were meant to be.

That will not happen on my watch. And so we will reform our nation’s health care system this year. We will uphold the human right to health care, and we will do it by ensuring that any legislation that I sign includes four non-negotiable elements:

First, it will cover everyone. All the time. No preexisting condition, no change or loss of job, no red tape or clerical error will stand in the way of your access to needed care. Where you live, what you look like, where you come from, will pose no barrier to your health care coverage.

Second, it will be affordable. To everyone. I’m going to say that again. It will be affordable to everyone.

Third, it will be comprehensive. It’s both just and economically sound that the care Americans need for a healthy and productive life—preventive care, emergency care, reproductive and neonatal care, geriatric care, mental health care—must be covered.

Now if you want that Botox injection for cosmetic reasons, you may have to save up your pennies. But when it comes to basic care, you will be covered.

And fourth, it will insist upon high quality care, holding our health care system accountable to patients while supporting our nation’s committed health care professionals.

Let me be clear. I will veto any plan that does not ensure these four essential elements.

But I am confident that I will not be called upon to veto a bill. Because it is clear that the American people want reform that includes these core elements. And I am confident that their elected representatives in Congress will respond to that demand.

So we will reform our health insurance system this year. We will reform it with Republican votes if possible, but we’ll reform it solely through with our Democratic majority if necessary. There are two ways of avoiding gridlock—one is through compromise and the other is through resolve. As you know, I prefer compromise. But if good faith negotiation is not forthcoming, we will use our party’s votes in Congress to achieve the change that’s needed. That’s what a majority means in our democracy.

Now, there’s been a lot of talk about public options, cooperatives, and other tools for getting this job done. It’s important to remember that they are only tools. I continue to believe that a public option—which means that the government will stand behind the guarantee of health care coverage if and when there are gaps in privately run insurance—is the most effective way to achieve our goals. I will not be inflexible in crafting reform, but I do insist that any attack on a public option or any other tool I’ve offered be accompanied by a concrete alternative that will achieve the core goals I’ve outlined: cover everyone, be affordable to everyone, be comprehensive for everyone, ensure the highest quality care for everyone.

We’ve also seen a lot of confusion and misinformation out there about this process—some of it in good faith and some of it the result of deliberate deception. For those Americans who are understandably confused about the elements of reform, we’ll be launching a new area of the whitehouse.gov website to provide clear information and to answer questions. We will also be setting up telephone hotlines in each region of the country to answer questions and provide information. And I am encouraging every member of Congress who supports commonsense health insurance reform to prepare their constituent service staff to do the same.

I also ask you, the American people, to ask of any proposal or counterproposal that’s out there, including mine: does it cover everyone? It is affordable to everyone? Is it comprehensive for everyone? Will it ensure the highest quality for everyone?

For the small group of organizations and politicians who are intentionally deceiving and scaring their fellow Americans with falsehoods about our vision of health insurance reform, you are on the wrong side of history. And you will fail. The American people want an insurance system that protects their fundamental human right to health care and, starting today, my administration and my allies in Congress will be relentless in communicating what reform will and will not mean.

We will not be jumping to counter every outrageous claim that you may make. That’s an old Washington game that we will no longer be playing. But we will be clear, plainspoken and rigorously honest about what our vision of reform will mean for all Americans. And I call upon our nation’s news media to fulfill their important responsibility to separate fact from fiction.

One clearly legitimate concern is the cost of this plan to the American people. Health insurance reform is an investment in America’s future that we cannot afford not to make. It is also true, however, that our nation must make sacrifices in the short term in order to finance that long-term investment. In addition to the savings we’ll accrue through economies of scale and reductions in waste and fraud, affluent Americans—those who’ve benefited most from our national prosperity—will have to pay somewhat more in taxes in the short term. This should be no surprise, as it was among the promises I made during my campaign. But, over time, this investment will pay off in dollars in cents, in economic security and prosperity, and in the innovation and opportunity that it will unleash in the American people. That dividend will benefit the most affluent Americans in at least the same proportions as it will benefit our nation as a whole.

So I say to you, my fellow Americans, that at this critical moment in our history, we will rise to the challenge. We will look back upon 2009 as the year that America fulfilled the human right to health care for all of its people, and year that we made a historic downpayment on our future.

Perry Godwin

Perry Godwin — Wed, 05 Aug 2009 09:52:37 -0700

The People for Positive Social Change (LCC-P4PSC) is a Lansing Community College student group under the auspices of the LCC Student Life & Leadership Office. The primary focus of LCC-P4PSC is to take action on political, social, and environmental issues involving peace, justice, equality, fairness, human rights, and sustainability that affect ourselves, the college, and the communities in which we live. In accordance with our mission, we do what we can to educate and inform people about what we see as the relevant problems of our times.

The mission of the LCC People for Positive Social Change group is: “Observing human rights for all, we will use our resources to improve our community in concrete, practical ways by contributing our time, philosophical arguments, love, and physical labor. As our ultimate goal, we seek peace – in all its various forms – from wisdom and serenity, to the absence of warfare, to a harmonious dynamic between humans and the natural world.”

P4PSC is affiliated with the Peace Education Center (PEC), the Greater Lansing Network Against War and Injustice (GLNAWI) group, and the LCC Sustainability Committee. We maintain an active presence on the LCC campus, where we provide counter-recruitment information to students, organize in opposition to the war in Iraq, support peace in Palestine and the Middle East, and work to make Lansing Community College a green and sustainable campus.

Kari Fulton

Kari Fulton — Wed, 20 May 2009 07:49:48 -0700

Featured as a young leader to watch by both Elle and Glamour Margazine, Kari Fulton is a noted activist in the Environmental Justice and Youth Climate Movement. Currently she is the National Campus Campaign Coordinator for the Environmental Justice and Climate Change Initiative. Through EJCC Fulton works to mobilize young people of color around environmental justice and campus sustainability. Recently Fulton was awarded the Brower New Leaders Award (Earth Island Institute) and the Damu Smith Power of One Young Professional Award (Deep South Center For Environmental Justice at Dillard University). Currently, Fulton acts as a spokesperson for the Energy Action Coalition is a senior fellow with Young People For the American Way (YP4) and a member of the YP4 Leadership Academy. She is also a graduate of the John H. Johnson School of Communications at Howard University. In her spare time Fulton is a blogger on checktheweather.net a member of the board of directors for the Lets Raise A Million Project and Dreaming Out Loud, an after-school program in DC.

isa kocher

isa kocher — Thu, 07 May 2009 21:43:27 -0700

so far outside the box, see my profile, look at my foto blog http://www.tiwiguide.com/

Torture, Accountability, and the Future

Alan Jenkins — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 06:48:06 -0700

Article 1 of the International Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment provides, in simple terms, that “torture means any act by which severe pain or suffering, whether physical or mental, is intentionally inflicted on a person for such purposes as obtaining from him or a third person information or a confession….” The Convention reaffirms the basic principle that intentionally inflicted suffering destroys the dignity of victim, the torturer, and the society that allows it.

Article 2 of the Convention provides that “no exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat or war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture,” and that “an order from a superior officer or a public authority may not be invoked as a justification of torture.” In other words, "no torture" means no torture. Ever.

With the release and analysis of Justice Department memos seeking to justify extreme interrogation methods by the CIA, we now know that the techniques included, at least, forced nudity, slamming detainees into walls, 11-day sleep deprivation, dousing detainees with frigid water, putting them in dark, cramped boxes—sometimes with insects to exploit their profound fears. C.I.A. interrogators used waterboarding, the intentional near-drowning of suspects to inspire fear of impending death, 266 times on just two key prisoners over a short period of time.

The methods described in the memos are chilling. They are un-American. And they are unquestionably torture. As a former Justice Department official myself, I read with near disbelief the lengths to which the memos’ authors twisted law and logic to provide cover to ghastly and inhumane practices that would be clearly illegal if perpetrated against animals, much less another human being. Consider one memo’s description of waterboarding:

“In this procedure, the individual is bound securely to an inclined bench, which is approximately four feet by seven feet. The individual's feet are generally elevated. A cloth is placed over the forehead and eyes. Water is then applied to the cloth in a controlled manner. As this is done, the cloth is lowered until it covers both the nose and mouth. Once the cloth is saturated and completely covers the mouth and nose, air flow is slightly restricted for 20 to 40 seconds due to the presence of the cloth. This causes an increase in carbon dioxide level in the individual's blood. This increase in the carbon dioxide level stimulates increased effort to breathe. This effort plus the cloth produces the perception of suffocation and incipient panic," i.e., the perception of drowning. The individual does not breathe any water into his lungs. During those 20 to 40 seconds, water is continuously applied from a height of twelve to twenty-four inches. After this period, the cloth is lifted, and the individual is allowed to breathe unimpeded for three or four full breaths. The sensation of drowning is immediately relieved by the removal of the cloth. The procedure may then be repeated. The water is usually applied from a canteen cup or small watering can with a spout. You have orally informed us that this procedure triggers an automatic physiological sensation of drowning that the individual cannot control even though he may be aware that he is in fact not drowning. You have also orally informed us that it is likely that this procedure would not last more 20 minutes in anyone application.”

Yet the same memo concludes that this practice—even when combined with others—is not torture because, while it does constitute a threat of imminent death, it does not inflict “prolonged mental harm.” That is so, the memo claims, because the CIA “advised us that the relief is almost immediate when the cloth is removed from the nose and mouth.” “In the absence of prolonged mental harm,” the memo continues, “no severe mental pain or suffering would have been inflicted, and the use of these procedures would not constitute torture.”

Consider it for a moment. You are a prisoner. You are slapped in the face by interrogators. You are grabbed by the face and pushed hard and loudly into walls. You are stripped naked. You are deprived of sleep for 11 days straight. You are placed in a small, dark box. You are deathly afraid of insects, and told that a stinging insect is being placed in the box with you. You are doused in cold water. Your face is covered by a cloth and you are intentionally made to feel that you are drowning, to death. But it is not torture, because you somehow did not experience prolonged mental harm.

I am ashamed. I’m ashamed that someone who shares my profession, who studied the same Constitution that I did, who worked for the same government I did in the same building where I worked, allowed this to happen. Endorsed it. Said that it was not torture. Said that it was consistent with our laws and our beliefs as Americans.

These were not snap decisions made on the battlefield. The CIA knew that these techniques were questionable, and asked the Justice Department for reasoned legal guidance. DOJ attorneys sat safely in their offices on Pennsylvania Avenue and clinically rationalized heinous acts on behalf of the American people. In all of our names.

And let’s be clear. Few would deny that Abu Zubaydah—waterboarded 83 times in August 2002 by C.I.A. officers—and Khalid Shaikh Mohammed—waterboarded 183 times in March 2003—are heinous, murderous villains. Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, in particular, is the self-described planner of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, which killed 3,000 Americans. We reject torture based on our nation's values, not based on theirs. The "inherent dignity of the human person" that underlies the Convention Against Torture is as much about our dignity as it is about those who endure torture and humiliation at the hands of our agents.

Although the United States government prosecuted some Japanese interrogators at war crimes trials after World War II for waterboarding and other methods described in these memos, President Obama says that C.I.A. officers who used the same methods with the approval of the Justice Department will not be prosecuted, and he has suggested that he opposes congressional proposals for a “truth commission” to examine Bush era interrogation and eavesdropping methods. While remaining mum on whether the memos’ authors might be subject to prosecution, the President said that “nothing will be gained by spending our time and energy laying blame for the past,” according to the New York Times.

That’s correct, but irrelevant. Accountability for possible human rights violations is not about blame, but about justice and preventing future atrocities. Indeed, we are obligated as a nation to fully investigate this conduct and to hold any violators—whatever their station—accountable. Failing to do so could perpetuate a new violation of the Convention Against Torture, which provides that suspected torturers must be investigated and, where the evidence supports it, prosecuted through a fair trial. Each party to the treaty “shall make these offences punishable by appropriate penalties which take into account their grave nature.”

Further, the decision whether to bring potential human rights violators to justice does not belong only to the President. The Senate Intelligence Committee has begun a yearlong, closed-door investigation of the C.I.A. interrogation program, and other congressional inquiries seem certain. Three of the memos’ authors, John C. Yoo, Jay S. Bybee, and Steven G. Bradbury, are the subjects of a pending report by the Justice Department’s ethics office. Some are calling for the impeachment of Bybee, who is now a federal judge. And there will undoubtedly be private lawsuits against the architects, as well as the implementers, of these monstrous techniques.

Facilitating a fair legal vetting of these claims is similarly part of our national human rights obligations; Article 14 of the Torture Convention provides that parties to the treaty “shall ensure in its legal system that the victim of an act of torture obtains redress and has an enforceable right to fair and adequate compensation including the means for as full rehabilitation as possible.”

Releasing the torture memos was a just and courageous act on the part of the Obama Administration. In the months to come, the Administration will have to grapple with the full implications of the acts that those memos detail, and the steps necessary to prevent either impunity or future violations. A clear-eyed look back will be crucial to moving forward.

Jason Paz

Jason Paz2 — Wed, 10 Dec 2008 11:04:21 -0800

Using Justice Against Us

Batocchio — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 13:54:22 -0800

Among the many decisions facing Barack Obama is what to do about the military prison at the Guantánamo Bay Naval Base, and the many prisoners held there for years, in most cases without trials or charges. On a larger scale, Obama and his team will be judging the Bush administration's very notions of justice, and the world will be watching.

Everything's gotten further entangled in recent months, thanks in part to the Bush administration. On the one hand, a judge ruled that seventeen Chinese prisoners should be released from Guantánamo after being held there for seven years without evidence being produced against them. However, not long ago, the D.C. Circuit Court ruled that the CIA can hide torture allegations. The Pentagon has dropped charges against some Guantánamo prisoners so they can reset the clock to avoid deadlines for bringing them to trial, all with the full intent of reinstating charges later. CIA officers could be put on trial for alleged torture of a British resident. Just yesterday, "a Justice Department lawyer... urged a federal judge to continue the detention of six Algerians at the U.S. military prison in Guantanamo Bay, contending they would "take up arms" and attack Americans if released." Their lawyers claim the men, who have been held for seven years, are innocent. That's not to mention all the issues of torture and general treatment, as well as the problems of a trial system Scott Horton's called "The Great Guantánamo Puppet Theater."

There are many more sorry tales, of course. Bush spoke last year about shutting down Guantánamo, but unsurprisingly, he's left it to be someone else's problem. And as David H. Schanzer writes:

Bush's decision represents a victory for Vice President Dick Cheney, who, according to reports, believes that keeping the prison open under a new administration would 'validate' Bush's detention policies. But there is no redeeming the detention and prosecution system at Guantánamo -- a system that has produced only two convictions in seven years, has been rebuked by the Supreme Court three times and has caused four military prosecutors to step down in disgust.

I don't see how the Cheney-Bush policies could be "validated," but regardless, the Obama administration will have to confront those policies and their consequences. To that end, I wanted to take a closer look at an older argument by John Yoo that I think epitomizes the Bush approach toward justice.

Yoo, of course, features heavily in accounts of the Bush administration's efforts to legalize torture, and he remains a prominent advocate for their Guantánamo trial system. On December 3rd, 2007, shortly before the Supreme Court heard arguments about Guantánamo and habeas corpus in Boumediene v. Bush, NPR ran arguments from Georgetown professor David Cole and (current Berkeley professor) John Yoo. Cole basically argued that everyone deserves a trial. Yoo argued something very different, employing some interesting rhetoric in the process. You can hear both statements here (it runs 5:22), but I've transcribed Yoo's argument:

Tomorrow, lawyers in the Supreme Court will demand that terrorists held at Guantanamo Bay get their day in federal court. Sounds reasonable. But granting terrorists this right would make for unprecedented judicial micromanagement of war. The writ of habeas corpus has never benefited enemy POWs in war, any war. In World War II, the U.S. held millions of POWs. None were allowed to use our civilian courts against us, except for the rare case of citizens who joined the Axis.

In 1950, twenty-one Nazi war criminals captured in China brought a suit, exactly like this one. They had passed intelligence to the Japanese, even after Germany had surrendered. Justice Robert Jackson, who'd been the Nuremberg prosecutor, wrote for the court that granting their plea would hamper the war effort and bring aid and comfort to the enemy. His words are just as true today.

We can't expect our soldiers in the field to worry about warrants, lawyers and Miranda. Making the military act like a police force will dull the sharp edge of their spears. Until September 10th, 2001, we tried to rely solely on law enforcement to stop terrorism. I don't want the military to hold POWs arbitrarily. I don't want to hold civilians. The Pentagon doesn't want to be the world's jailer. Detainees are screened and reviewed multiple times. Only those who present the highest threat or have the most intelligence are sent to Guantanamo Bay. More procedures will mean less resources and less information for fighting al-Qaeda.

This is not a case of reining in an out-of-control president. The September 11th bombings put us at war. Congress authorized hostilities a week later. But in 2006, for the first the time in our nation's history, the Supreme Court tried to grant review of POW cases. Congress immediately overturned them in the Military Commissions Act. No court has ever challenged the president and Congress during war time. But our judges have already declared abortion, race and religion off-limits from the democratic process. Allowing them to interfere in core military decisions would represent yet another grasp of power by an imperial judiciary. This time, though, it may come at a steep cost.

Yoo's argument can be dissected and challenged many different ways, but I'd argue it's overflowing with implicit assertions that are challengeable, misleading or false. To go in rough order, he suggests that: all Guantánamo prisoners are terrorists, they are all guilty, civilian courts are the wrong method to deal with them, the Nuremberg trials support Yoo's argument, soldiers on a battlefield have to issue warrants and read Miranda rights to enemy combatants, a law enforcement approach to terrorism is ineffective, such an approach allowed the 9/11 attacks, John Yoo wants justice, all Guantánamo prisoners have been reviewed, they are all dangerous, using existing trial systems would endanger the "war on terror," using existing trial systems would somehow "interfere with core military decisions," giving due process to prisoners will somehow lead to "less resources and less information," Bush is not out of control, this is all about 9/11, Bush, Congress and the will of the people are being thwarted by the Supreme Court, which is overreaching as they always do, but this time in unprecedented and dangerous fashion, and it is the Supreme Court, not the Bush administration, that is acting in an "imperial" manner and must be curtailed – or else horrible things may happen. Whew! Shorter version: We know what we're doing, these are really bad guys who deserve to be punished, and don't question us.

It would take a long time to rebut every point of Yoo's thoroughly, and that's a key element to his technique – throw out as many claims as he can, make an emotional appeal, and try to sell some key falsehoods without anybody noticing. It generally takes longer to rebut a misleading claim than to make one. Feel free to challenge any of my characterizations above, or to delve into a different line of Yoo's, but when I first heard his argument, the line that leapt out at me and that has stuck with me almost a year later is: "None were allowed to use our civilian courts against us."

Yoo's got a pretty flat delivery if you listen to the audio, but to my ear it sounds like he's trying to sound wounded here – what a horrible, horrible thing this is – but regardless, it's a bizarre argument. How can a process of justice possibly be used "against us"? Doesn't justice entail punishing the guilty and exonerating that innocent? How can that possibly be bad? Yoo says these men are terrorists. Does Yoo mean that civilian courts can't be trusted to find them as such, to keep them imprisoned, or perhaps execute them? Does Yoo mean these men don't deserve trials, because that would be too good for them? Does he mean civilian courts or the normal military judicial system can't be trusted to punish these (supposedly) evil men sufficiently? I think this last one is precisely what he's implying, but even the most charitable reading doesn't hold up well for Yoo, because of a key, false premise implicit throughout his entire argument. He uses the word "terrorists" twice in two sentences, and later on throws in Nazis and 9/11 for good measure. Yoo is claiming all these men are guilty. They have done or tried to do us harm. He wants us to accept these premises without question. His other points are largely a smokescreen compared to selling this.

Now if only there was a way to determine the guilt or innocence of these men. Hmm.

Yoo is trying to sell a bypassing of existing systems of justice here, or really justice altogether. It's similar to what Cheney, Addington, Libby, Feith and others did with manipulating intelligence to sell the Iraq War. The Bush administration has often followed this pattern, asserting that it is right, it is infallible, and don't question it. Most arguments that Bush officials or their advocates have made in defense of Guantánamo (indefinite imprisonment, not bringing charges, the treatment of prisoners, the special trial system) have depended on Yoo's stealth thesis, that everyone they've imprisoned is guilty. I also think Yoo and his colleagues are appealing to fear, a desire for vengeance, and in some cases, bigotry. It's an element that deserves its own post, but their basic pitch is: These prisoners are guilty, they're foreign, they speak a different language, and they don't look like Peggy Noonan. Who can tell them apart? And why should you care about what happens to them? They're the Evil Other, and they're scary.

I'm not going to delve into every other point of Yoo's, but there are a few others I find interesting. His last rush, talking about activist judges and "abortion, race and religion" is rather odd, intentionally vague, and almost nonsensical. It sounds like a pander to right-wing attitudes, but that breaks with the "I'm a reasonable guy" persona he's trying to sell earlier. Still, if taken seriously, is Yoo suggesting fundamental rights should be decided by majority rule? Even if we say that Yoo is somehow defending the 'will of the people,' it contradicts his relentless advocacy of unlimited power for the president. Most infamously, he asserted that no treaty or law could prevent the president from crushing the testicles of a child. Meanwhile, the "Miranda" talking point remains as popular as it is ludicrous among many conservatives, and at best is a slippery slope argument. On the war time powers front, in Boumediene v. Bush the Supreme Court somehow disagreed with the Yoo point of view, instead reaffirming that habeas corpus is a fundamental right that can only be suspended in times of rebellion or invasion. Glenn Greenwald has also delved into this issue on many occasions.

It's also noteworthy that Yoo cites Robert Jackson and invokes Nuremberg. (The case he cites, Johnson v. Eisentrager, is here. An overview is here, and refers to "German nationals" and not Yoo's more charged "Nazi war criminals." The Germans, in China, had told the Japanese about U.S. troop movements in China after Germany had surrendered, committing a crime significantly different from what was being prosecuted at Nuremberg.) In actuality, as many observers have noted, the Guantánamo trial system is the antithesis of the Nuremberg trials. Yoo also glosses over the fact that the Germans he mentions actually received a trial, something denied most Guantánamo prisoners for years. Scott Horton put it well when discussing the Hamdan trial at Guantánamo:

The Bush Administration could have handled this matter in the tradition that the nation’s greatest modern attorney general, Robert Jackson, set out at Nuremberg. Jackson personally took charge of the first prosecutions, delivering mesmerizing opening and closing statements and a dramatic cascade of evidence that targeted some of the most heinous criminals from the Second World War. Jackson had two important objectives before he reached the question of the guilt or innocence of the individual defendants: he needed to validate the fairness of the process, and he needed to demonstrate, clearly and convincingly in the eyes of the world, that heinous crimes had been committed which justified this extraordinary tribunal process. Jackson accomplished both goals. He also secured the conviction of key kingpins in the Nazi terror state. He did it all within the first year of the Allied occupation of Germany, through a process that helped transform the German people from enemies to friends. In the end, Jackson and his team demonstrated that the American tradition of justice was a potent tool to be wielded against the nation’s enemies.

By contrast, America has now endured seven years of an administration which fears the rule of law, which operates in the shadows as it contravenes criminal statutes and long-cherished traditions and retaliates mercilessly against civil servants who stand for law and principle. George Bush and his political advisors openly castigate law and justice as weaknesses or vulnerabilities–as public suspicions grow that they have darker reasons to be concerned about the law. Instead of following the historic route and using military commissions that follow the nation’s long-standing traditions, they have crafted embarrassing kangaroo courts. When the Supreme Court brought its gavel down on one of their shameful contraptions, they simply concocted another, equally shameful one, openly proclaiming an inferior brand of justice for those who were “not citizens,” exalting in the right to use torture-extracted evidence and to transact the proceedings in secret.

Or, as Lance Mannion put it, "Nuremberg? Nuremberg? Weren't the torturers the ones on trial in that one?"

Wouldn't have legitimate trials of actual terrorists, years ago, helped the Bush administration's crediblity? No one has ever said that actual, proven terrorists should not be kept in prison. Instead, critics of Guantánamo have pushed for due process, transparency, and humane treatment. They have pushed for justice, in an American tradition that includes Jackson at Nuremberg, but runs far deeper. That push for justice over the past seven years has come from both liberals and rule-of-law conservatives such as former Navy General Counsel Alberto Mora and members of the JAG corps.

Yoo's premises, so central to the Bush administration's approach to justice, don't hold up well to scrutiny. They can be tested in terms of rhetoric and logic, they can be examined in terms of case law - and they can be challenged by reality. A McClatchy series on Guantánamo has shown that the U.S. imprisoned or still holds dozens or even hundreds of men who are innocent. Furthermore:

The McClatchy investigation found that top Bush administration officials knew within months of opening the Guantanamo detention center that many of the prisoners there weren't "the worst of the worst." From the moment that Guantanamo opened in early 2002, former Secretary of the Army Thomas White said, it was obvious that at least a third of the population didn't belong there.

There are more well known cases, too, but claiming that all these men are guilty - and so should be denied due process – becomes indefensible when one knows of innocent people, and also knows that the Bush administration knows they are innocent. The Bush administration's support for indefinite imprisonment without charges and an "inferior brand of justice" for those who actually receive a trial seems to hinge more on the issue of torture - admitting coerced confessions as evidence, squelching torture allegations, and never admitting blame. It's a subject treated in far greater depth in books such as Torture Team, The Dark Side and Angler, documentaries such as Torturing Democracy and Taxi to the Dark Side, and on quite a few blogs (law-oriented and otherwise). There's a question of whether John Yoo and some of his compatriots could be found guilty of war crimes. Seen in that light, it's not just that they continue to deny prisoners justice – they want to evade justice themselves.

The Guantánamo prison has long been some nightmare out of Orwell and Kafka. Men and women in power who fear justice are not likely to want to see it pursued. Perhaps when John Yoo said, "none were allowed to use our civilian courts against us," he didn't mean "us" as in "Americans," but rather "us" as in "me and my colleagues." The Obama administration will have plenty of messes to clean up, but this one can go far in restoring America's image in the world. It may in fact be one of the starkest contrasts an Obama administration can make, re-establishing the American tradition of humane treatment, due process and justice for all, in opposition to the perverse notion that some are infallible, unaccountable, and "more equal than others."

Martha Warner

martawarner — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 11:02:46 -0800

Born in Kansas City, KS during the Great Depression. Father a truck driver, mother a stay-at-home Mom, who was
disabled. Both parents worked incredibly hard but never moved out of the lower class. I won scholarships to college, and also worked part-time to achieve a Bachelors, then an MA in Sociology, complete with Phi Beta Kappa membership.

My husband became a college prof of political science at the U. of Vermont, and died at age 40, leaving me with
four children to finish rearing. I taught Social Studies in High School for 30 years, in Vermont. My son Rick has a PhD in history from U. CA and teaches history at a small liberal arts college. My daughter Marianne teaches in a middle school in Maine and is completing her Master's Degree, during the summer. My daughter Suzanne has a Master's Degree and works for the state of DE. My son John is ill.

I traveled a bit after retirement and have now settled in the "Triangle" area of N.C. I found my home via research; I was looking for a mild climate area populated by a diverse population, with Progressive policies and ideas. It's here. My little town of Carrboro is a very friendly town, an interesting and satisfying place to retire.

I am a Progressive. I participated in the Civil Rights movement in DC and Selma, AL, and my name is on the
WALL of TOLERANCE, honoring Rosa Parks, in Montgomery, AL and I am one of the founding members of the Memorial to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., being constructed in DC. I belong to the ACLU, Amnesty, SPLCenter, the Humanist society, and other progressive groups. I like to quilt, write, cook, workout and travel, in addition to
keeping up with happenings in my town, nation, and around the world. PEACE to each and all.

Rights Group Condemns U.S., NATO Air Strikes

OurFuture.org Staff — Mon, 08 Sep 2008 08:51:18 -0700

U.S. and NATO air bombings in Afghanistan have killed more than 500 civilians since 2006, fueling a public backlash against the coalition's war effort, a prominent human rights group said Monday. Human Rights Watch, an international organization based in New York, blamed some of the civilian deaths on Taliban and al Qaida insurgents who create "human shields" by blending into populated areas. But the group also criticized mainly U.S. commanders for launching bombing raids under looser military "rules of engagement" than those followed by other NATO nations with troops in Afghanistan.