Our New Attorney General?

[JohnnyMarzetti]

This ought to reassure the securalists and those fearing a religious state.... (http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/11/10/bush.cabinet/index.html)

[regarding girls under 18 not having to get parental consent for an abortion]

"While the ramifications of such a law may be personally troubling to me as a parent, it is my obligation as a judge to impartially apply the laws of this state without imposing my moral view on the decisions of the legislature."

Sounds like what Kerry said to me.

[Marcus Bryant]

You mean a politician pledged to follow the laws as written in a campaign? Shocking.

I think it's a bit ironic given your political persuasion that you are praising the comments of an individial who is apparently committed to following the law as written.

[Spurminator]

Good. Hopefully he will remain true to that statement with his actions for the next four years.

[Marcus Bryant]

Good. Hopefully he will remain true to that statement with his actions for the next four years.

Indeed. The significance of that statement seems to be lost on JohnnyM.

[JohnnyMarzetti]

The point I was making is that he made a statement just like John Kerry did regarding imposing his moral beliefs on the law as it should be.

You are the one who appears to be lost.

[Marcus Bryant]

Oh lil' John, I think I understood what you were trying to say.

You shouldn't have a problem with any of Bush's likely judicial appointments then.

[JohnnyMarzetti]

Well I'm not sure I'm so thrilled about this guy

Salon article on Alberto Gonzales (http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2003/12/10/waagner/)

Gonzales' four years as White House counsel have angered lawmakers in both parties. Critics say he has a penchant for secrecy and claims of executive privilege on everything from energy policy to homeland security.

That record has made Gonzales a target for critics on the left and the right.

Liberals fret about his role in the legal memoranda that appeared to allow U.S. forces to mistreat prisoners in Iraq and elsewhere. In one, he questioned if the Geneva Conventions' prisoner-of-war rules are too "quaint" for the war on terror.

Ralph Neas of the liberal People for the American Way attacked Gonzales "role in the development of policies that ultimately led to the Abu Ghraib prison scandals in Iraq."

[Marcus Bryant]

Well he isn't the first to point out that the "terrorists" in Iraq and Afghanistan aren't members of a traditional state force. If I am not mistaken the Geneva Convention applies to members of a regular armed force. Spies and terrorists are in another category.

[JohnnyMarzetti]

But I'm encouraged that A week after Bush's heady victory, President Bush was handed a defeat (http://www.thejournalnews.com/newsroom/111004/10edguantanamotr.html) by a federal court that instructed him he does not have the power to invent exceptions to international law and U.S. standards of justice in the treatment of prisoners being held at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

The war on terror must be aggressively and decisively pursued. But in the process, America must not lose its way, forgetting the very principles it is defending."

More....In the latest judicial rebuff of the administration's handling of prisoners seized in Afghanistan, a U.S. District Court judge in Washington, D.C., found that the president exceeded his constitutional authority and disregarded the Geneva Conventions in trying a Yemeni man as a terrorist suspect before a military commission. The short-circuited justice system could endanger Americans seized as war prisoners and "could not be countenanced in any American court," Judge James Robertson ruled Monday.

The decision halted the proceeding against Salim Ahmed Mandan, who has been held at the U.S. military base in Cuba since 2002. It potentially affects plans for about 500 other detainees.

At the core of the administration's problem in this and earlier court rulings is the president's unilateral declaration that certain prisoners are "enemy combatants" not entitled to the due process required by international and U.S. law. The president's say-so does not make it so, judges have said in important reminders that a president who hopes to export the rule of law to enslaved peoples also must abide by it.

In the Hamdan case, the judge found that the government ignored a provision of the Geneva Conventions that requires a detainee to be treated as a prisoner of war unless a special tribunal determined that he was something different. Bush's enemy-combatant fiat replaced the proper tribunal. A prisoner of war accused of war crimes must be tried in a court-martial, with rights to confront accusers and evidence, not available before a military commission.

Flouting the Geneva Conventions, Judge Robertson noted, "can only weaken the United States' own ability to demand application of the Geneva applications to Americans captured during armed conflicts abroad."

[Marcus Bryant]

First off that is a district court ruling.


At the core of the administration's problem in this and earlier court rulings is the president's unilateral declaration that certain prisoners are "enemy combatants" not entitled to the due process required by international and U.S. law. The president's say-so does not make it so, judges have said in important reminders that a president who hopes to export the rule of law to enslaved peoples also must abide by it.

So the distinction which I described does exist.


In the Hamdan case, the judge found that the government ignored a provision of the Geneva Conventions that requires a detainee to be treated as a prisoner of war unless a special tribunal determined that he was something different.

So when the special tribunal says he's an "enemy combatant" then he loses the Geneva protection.

[JohnnyMarzetti]

First off that is a district court ruling.



So the distinction which I described does exist.



So when the special tribunal says he's an "enemy combatant" then he loses the Geneva protection.

True, but not just because Bush says so is the point the judge was making.

[Marcus Bryant]

One court's interpretation.

The broader point is that ultimately those who are "enemy combatants" are not subject to the Geneva protections.

[samikeyp]

Oh lil' John, I think I understood what you were trying to say.


http://www.lingosphere.com/mt/images/up-pov_lil_jon-thumb.jpg

"Yeah!"