The Constitution just a goddammed piece of paper? Say it ain't so! Bloggers, who posted on this years ago, shake their heads wearily.
Misadministration sought unchecked wartime authority --
Legal experts said Tuesday they wereshocked... shocked! ahem, taken aback by the claim in the latest batch of secret Bush-era memos that the president alone had the power to set the rules during the war on terrorism.
Yale law professor Jack Balkin called this a "theory of presidential dictatorship. They say the battlefield is everywhere. And the president can do anything he wants, so long as it involves the military and the enemy."
Congress had prohibited the use of torture by U.S. agents, and it said "no citizen shall be imprisoned" in this country without legal charges. The memos said neither law could stand in the way of the president's power as commander in chief.
"You can never get over how bad these opinions were," said Dellinger, who headed the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel in the Clinton administration. "The assertion that Congress has no role to play with respect to the detention of prisoners was contrary to the Constitution's text, to judicial precedent and to historical practice. For people who supposedly follow the text [of the Constitution], what don't they understand?"
After reading the memos, Harpers’ Scott Horton wrote, “We may not have realized it at the time, but in the period from late 2001-January 19, 2009, this country was a dictatorship.”
Legal experts said Tuesday they were
Yale law professor Jack Balkin called this a "theory of presidential dictatorship. They say the battlefield is everywhere. And the president can do anything he wants, so long as it involves the military and the enemy."
Congress had prohibited the use of torture by U.S. agents, and it said "no citizen shall be imprisoned" in this country without legal charges. The memos said neither law could stand in the way of the president's power as commander in chief.
"You can never get over how bad these opinions were," said Dellinger, who headed the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel in the Clinton administration. "The assertion that Congress has no role to play with respect to the detention of prisoners was contrary to the Constitution's text, to judicial precedent and to historical practice. For people who supposedly follow the text [of the Constitution], what don't they understand?"
After reading the memos, Harpers’ Scott Horton wrote, “We may not have realized it at the time, but in the period from late 2001-January 19, 2009, this country was a dictatorship.”
What's this "we" shit? We unpatriotic America-hating Islamocommiedefeatohomofascist terristlovers were covering it as it was happening. Where the hell were you guys?
3 comments:
Still waiting for our apologies....chirp....chirp...
How do you think the corporate Republican leaning media will cover the story about suspending freedom of the press? Or maybe that did happen and that's why we got such stilted coverage for 8 years?
GAWD, no CHIT MARU!!!! what does anyone think all the screaming and jumping up and down and freaking yelling was about here on the left (in reality)????
THIS IS SO NOT NEWS! idjits who think it IS.
this country was a dictatorship INDEED.
(grumble stupid is as stupid WRITES!)
SHEEEEEEEEEESH.
siri
amazing, isn't it?
or it would be if it wasn't so freaking typical.
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