This morning I attended a Margaret Kelliher "presentation" at the Sabathani Senior Center. At least it was called a "presentation" on the flyer that I saw. I thought maybe I might get a chance to ask her my question.
I am a single-issue voter. It's a pro-life issue. Every time I got a call from candidates' volunteers -- and when I called the three DFL campaign offices -- I asked my question. No one has gotten back to me, so I figured here was my chance to ask a real live candidate.
Ms. Kelliher's opening remarks included the following: "Most importantly, I will listen to your concerns." That made me even more hopeful that I'd get a chance to ask my question. I am so naive.
I recently sent the following email to Dean Thomas Mengler of the University of St. Thomas School of Law. The local Tackling Torture at the Top group has been protesting there for several years. Robert Delahunty, while in the Office of Legal Counsel, co-wrote several memos with John Yoo, some of which still remain secret. Most notable of those released to the public is a Jan. 9, 2002, memo which said the Geneva Conventions did not apply to al Qaeda and Taliban detainees. That memo never mentioned the Convention Against Torture or the Youngstown Steel case, a seminal Supreme Court decision on Presidential powers. The Supreme Court rejected part of the Yoo-Delahunty analysis in its Hamdan decision. Mr. Delahunty is now a Professor of Law at the University of St. Thomas School of Law, where he has led a bible study group, and whose Dean has defended him by pointing out that Delahunty was not involved in writing the more infamous "torture memos."
There are only 10 days left of June but it's not too late to learn about these serious issues and get involved! The following main events featuring nationally known speakers are all free and open to the public next weekend June 26-27:
Honoring Victims of Torture Saturday, June 26, 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. 717 East River Parkway, Minneapolis. The Center for Victims of Torture honors torture survivors on UN International Day in Support of Victims of Torture. Sponsored by: the Center for Victims of Torture. Endorsed by: the WAMM Tackling Torture at the Top (T3) Committee. FFI: Email tacklingtorture@gmail.com.
Film Screening: "Torturing Democracy" Saturday, June 26, 7:00 p.m. Walker Community Church, 3104 16th Avenue South, Minneapolis. "The documentary 'Torturing Democracy' tells the story of how the United States government circumvented tradition and law to adopt torture as official policy. The film, produced by award-winning filmmaker Sherry Jones, draws on interviews, archival footage, and recently declassified documents to piece together the development and dissemination of torture tactics from Bagram in Afghanistan to Guantanamo Bay and Abu Ghraib-and the document trail leads right to the top of the chain of command."
Educational Panel Discussion Sunday, June 27, 3:00 to 5:00 p.m. Plymouth Congregational Church, 1900 Nicollet Avenue South, Minneapolis. Attend an educational forum around the question, "Do the Geneva Conventions on cruelty still apply?" and others. Participants include: Marjorie Cohn, immediate past president of the National Lawyers Guild; Captain James Yee, former U.S. Army Muslim Chaplain at the prison at Guantanamo, Cuba; Ellen Kennedy, PhD, Interim Director of the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies at the University of Minnesota; and Jack Nelson-Pallmeyer, Assistant Professor of Peace and Justice Studies at the University of St. Thomas. Co-sponsored or endorsed by Amnesty International, Center for Victims of Torture, Veterans for Peace, MN Chapter of National Lawyers Guild and MN ACLU.
Ladies and Gentlemen, yours truly - the ol' TwoPutter - is Guest Hosting this afternoon's Friday Edition of "Quick On The UpTake" from 5:00 to 6:00pm on AM-950 KTNF, The Voice of Minnesota. Mike McIntee is taking some well-earned time time off.
Then we'll be having a conversation with Rep. Al Juhnke and Pamela Crowley, about important legislation concerning home mortgage appraisals to protect consumers!
And, as usual on Friday's Edition of Quick On The UpTake, we'll also be getting a call from Dane Smith from GrowthAndJustice.org.
The call-in number is 952-946-6205 to join in the conversation!
So, again, tune in your radio today to AM-950 KTNF, or listen live on your computer, here!
I am part of a group of people who, since last November, have engaged in a daily vigil for torture accountability at the Federal Building in Minneapolis. Usually it's a solitary individual, symbolic not only of our small numbers but also of the vulnerability of the detainees held all across the planet.
Wearing an orange jumpsuit and black hood, I hold my sign, which says, "I Am Waiting For Justice." Some passersby half-jokingly shout out, "Aren't we all!" Indeed we are.
WE ARE WAITING for a full accounting of what Major General Antonio Taguba called our "systematic regime of torture." We need to know what was done and what is still being done in our names.
WE ARE WAITING for B. Todd Jones, the United States Attorney for Minnesota, to respond to our request for a meeting, so we can explain why we think he has jurisdiction and a legal and moral obligation to investigate allegations of torture.
WE ARE WAITING for Mr. Jones to remember he took an oath to support and defend the Constitution, not the President and not the Attorney General.
WE ARE WAITING for any United States Attorney to tell President Obama and Attorney General Holder that when judges, inspectors general and Pentagon investigators say we tortured people, we must investigate those claims.
WE ARE WAITING for Minnesota's United States Senators and for Minneapolis' and St. Paul's Congresspersons to open their eyes to torture and to respond to the issues raised in meetings we've had with their staff members since January. Silence is complicity.
WE ARE WAITING for the Obama administration to stop renditioning people to countries our State Department has criticized for abusing prisoners, to refrain from raising obstacles for torture victims who seek redress in our courts, and to begin the healing process by fully examining what we have done.
WE ARE WAITING for anyone in government, for any court, to say, "We are a nation of laws. We have signed treaties; we have passed statutes. Torture must be addressed."
WE ARE WAITING for those who seek to protect our troops, strengthen our alliances, regain our credibility on human rights, and enhance our security to speak out in favor of accountability for torture.
WE ARE WAITING for the American public to rise up and say, "Not in our names. Investigate. Prosecute if necessary. Stop renditions. Allow redress for claims of torture to go forward."
WE ARE WAITING, but our patience is wearing thin. Join us in telling our government the time for waiting is over.
June has been designated Torture Awareness Month by the National Religious Campaign Against Torture. Help keep torture from being swept under the rug. Join in the various free public "Torture Awareness Month" events sponsored by a coalition of anti-torture and human rights groups in the Twin Cities, including Amnesty International and the Women Against Military Madness' "Tackling Torture at the Top" Committee. Come to the daily vigils held each weekday at noon in front of the federal courthouse in Minneapolis, programs every Tuesday (7:00 p.m.) at the Mad Hatter's Tea House in St. Paul, a June 23 United Council of Churches program at Richfield United Methodist Church (7:00-9:00 p.m.), a June 26 Center for Victims of Torture outdoor event honoring torture survivors (11:00 a.m.-1:00 p.m.), a June 26 showing of the film "Torturing Democracy" at Walker Church (7:00 p.m.), and a June 27 forum (3 to 5 pm) on torture at Plymouth Congregational Church. (For more information, see www.worldwidewamm.org/calendar.html.)
While this is a MN-specific blog, I occasionally comment on national issues. Torture, it's cover-up by the Obama Administration and the prosecution of the whistleblowers by the Obama Administration is one of those issues. This topic is one that really is a real pain in where my hope meets my change.
As progressives we cannot ignore these facts even though we think Obama is awesome and only want the best for him. It's our job to hold him to a higher standard.
Physicians for Human Rights yesterday released a report documenting (while relying on heavily redacted material) that "medical professionals who were involved in the Central Intelligence Agency's interrogations of terrorism suspects engaged in forms of human research and experimentation in violation of medical ethics and domestic and international law." To those paying close attention, the evidence suggesting that this occurred has long been clear. Today, The New York Times Editorial Page said this:
The report from the physicians' group does not prove its case beyond doubt -- how could it when so much is still hidden? -- but it rightly calls on the White House and Congress to investigate the potentially illegal human experimentation and whether those who authorized or conducted it should be punished. Those are just two of the many unresolved issues from the Bush administration that President Obama and Congressional leaders have swept under the carpet.
When the history of the Bush era is written, the obvious question will be: what was done about the systematic war crimes, torture regime, chronic lawbreaking, and even human experimentation which that administration perpetrated on the world? And the answer is now just as obvious: nothing, because the subsequent President -- Barack Obama -- decreed that We Must Look Forward, Not Backward, and then engaged in extreme measures to carry out that imperial, Orwellian dictate by shielding those crimes from investigation, review, adjudication and accountability.
(Glenn Greenwald)
What I don't get is why the Obama Administration is covering up for Republican war crimes to lessen the political rancor when the Republicans jump at the slightest chance to increase the political rancor. If he would hold Republicans accountable for their crimes, would future Republicans then think twice about doing the same? If Obama holds them accountable, what's the worst that could happen? Impeachment? The Republicans will try it at the first opportunity regardless.
Rep. John Kline (R-MN) was elevated to the top minority spot on the House Education and Labor Committee not because he has any expertise in education or much knowledge about economics and labor. No, he was the highest ranking available Republican not tainted by scandals involving prostitutes, diapers, corruption or some combination thereof.
So consider this little snippet of Kline displaying his ignorance in a New Hampshire newspaper:
Voting yes: Reps. Carol Shea-Porter and Paul Hodes, both Democrats.
Abusive student discipline: Voting 262 for and 153 against, the House on Wednesday passed a bill (HR 4247) setting federal standards and authorizing grants to states to curb the abusive discipline of K-12 students in public and private schools. Now before the Senate, the bill addresses practices such as duct-taping and other forcible restraints that inflict harm, seclusion in locked rooms and the application of drugs not prescribed by the student's doctor. The bill would extend to schools the same federal protection against physical abuse that applies to hospitals and other community institutions receiving federal funds.
Rep. George Miller, a Democrat from California, said: "When these abuses occur, it isn't just the individual victim who suffers. It hurts their classmates who witness these traumatizing events. It undermines the vast majority of teachers and staff who are trying to give students a quality education. It's a nightmare for everyone involved."
Rep. John Kline, a Republican from Minnesota, said the bill infringes on state authority and is "an invitation to trial lawyers who will eagerly take every opportunity to sue school districts. . . . In fact, there's a very real danger that schools will stop addressing safety issues entirely out of fear they could be sued."
A yes vote was to pass the bill.
This bill is to prevent restraining kids with duct tape, locking in closets or restraining kids in ways that torture or even lead to killing children.
Kline is more concerned about trial attorneys than he is with the safety of our nation's children.
You may recall from my rant last week about how the Minneapolis Star Tribune will not frontpage any bad news concerning Republicans. Well here's something that I guarantee will not make the paper:
Professor Francis A. Boyle of the University of Illinois College of Law in Champaign, U.S.A. has filed a Complaint with the Prosecutor for the International Criminal Court (I.C.C.) in The Hague against U.S. citizens George W. Bush, Richard Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, George Tenet, Condoleezza Rice, and Alberto Gonzales (the "Accused") for their criminal policy and practice of "extraordinary rendition" perpetrated upon about 100 human beings. This term is really their euphemism for the enforced disappearance of persons and their consequent torture. This criminal policy and practice by the Accused constitute Crimes against Humanity in violation of the Rome Statute establishing the I.C.C.
The United States is not a party to the Rome Statute. Nevertheless the Accused have ordered and been responsible for the commission of I.C.C. statutory crimes within the respective territories of many I.C.C. member states, including several in Europe. Consequently, the I.C.C. has jurisdiction to prosecute the Accused for their I.C.C. statutory crimes under Rome Statute article 12(2)(a) that affords the I.C.C. jurisdiction to prosecute for I.C.C. statutory crimes committed in I.C.C. member states.
(Daily Kos)
While neither the news columns of the StarTribune nor the idiot box's news shows ever mention the phrase, a small group of us are demanding accountability for torture. Virtually every weekday since Nov. 12, 2009, we have conducted a daily one-hour vigil in front of the U.S. Courthouse, otherwise known as the Federal Building, in Minneapolis. B. Todd Jones, the U.S. Attorney for the District of Minnesota, has his offices in that building. Regrettably, Mr. Jones has forgotten we are a nation of laws. Usually the vigil is only a single person, dressed in an orange jumpsuit and a black hood, with a sign and sometimes with leaflets.
Our efforts have had to confront the "what-First-Amendment?" response of court security personnel. I was the guinea pig on the first day of the vigil. After about ten minutes sitting there with my sign that said "I Am Waiting" on one side and "For Justice" on the other, three guards approached me from different angles and asked me to remove my hood. They frisked me, asked for an i.d., refused to let me go retrieve a cap that I had a half block away (it was cold and windy that day), checked me for federal warrants, and told me I couldn't wear the hood. I told them about the First Amendment and that people had been wearing such hoods in demonstrations all across the country, even in front of the White House. The fellow in charge told me there was a Minnesota law prohibiting it, and that even if a lawyer argued the Minnesota law didn't apply, I couldn't wear the hood because it was alarming to people. I asked if my sign and orange jumpsuit alarmed people, would I have to stop using them as well? He said he would talk to those people instead. I suggested that if there were any place that the First Amendment should apply, surely it would apply in front of the Federal Building.
This Saturday, a time bomb will start ticking. The eight-year statute-of-limitations period applicable to the Federal Torture Statute will soon expire. Then, for time immemorial, it will be official: If you torture or conspire to torture in the name of the United States of America, no consequences will follow. We will have officially sanctioned torture.
Why this Saturday? On January 9, 2002, a memo not as well known as the so-called "torture memos" was completed by John Yoo and Robert Delahunty. Addressed to Defense Department General Counsel William Haynes II, and titled "Application of Laws and Treaties to al Qaeda and Taliban Detainees," it is one scary memo. It may be the first evidence of our national policy of torture, what Major General Antonio Taguba, the man selected by the Pentagon to report on Abu Ghraib, called "a systematic regime of torture." The John Yoo and Jay Bybee memos that followed in August of 2002, with their it's-not-torture-until-organ-failure-occurs, have gotten much more publicity. But the Jan. 9 memo, written in much less inflammatory legalese, was the memo that may well have given the green light for torture. This is where the conspiracy to torture may have begun. Here's why.
You guessed right if you guessed the problem with the right's assertion that constitutional rights apply only to citizens is most rights apply to persons, not citizens. Take partial credit if you guessed some rights are granted under treaties, since treaties are law and we have ratified human rights treaties addressing the treatment of prisoners. However, even if we hadn't ratified any such treaties, non-citizens would still be protected under the Constitution.
If you want to hear it from people with actual credentials as constitutional experts, here's a transcript of a panel discussion on the rights of non-citizens held by the American Constitution Society. It you read the transcript, what's striking is how assumed it is that non-citizens are protected, even by a panelist from the Bush administration.
Here's that same assumption in an interview with a constitutional law professor posted on Free Republic. Seriously, yes, that Free Republic, though the comments were less than supportive. I noticed though the commenters just didn't like non-citizens having rights. They didn't actually dispute that they do, I suppose because if even a fringe site like that admits it, it's tough not to believe it.
However, you can see this yourself in the text of the Constitution.
(This should be a good one! - promoted by Joe Bodell)
One of the common defenses conservatives make for using torture and illegal imprisonment (secret detention, imprisonment without charge or trial, no access to lawyers, secret evidence, etc.) is that only citizens have constitutional rights. At least they're acknowledging that citizens have some rights, even if they can't name any except the right to own guns. Still when it comes to how we treat terrorism suspects, they have only such rights as we choose to give them at our whim, so there's no right to complain about the conditions of their imprisonment or the conduct of their trials, even if prisoners are tortured.
Though I've been having fun with debunking the right, I see a need to debunk something on the left too. Specifically, I'm referring to this moroseness afflicting many of us who were getting ready to party a year ago as we looked forward to a new Congress and new president. Plenty has gone wrong this year, sure. We poured our personal wealth and elbow grease into electing people who in some cases have disappointed us. It seems we're always having to give up something really good in hopes of getting just something.
However, a lot has gone right in this year ending tonight, more than many of us have recognized. The health care bill has sucked the air out of the proverbial room. More troops heading to Afghanistan has grabbed most of the attention available for foreign policy. The biggest complaint of many on the left, me included, has been the continuation of Bush policies in regard to civil liberties and human rights.
It's been long enough since I posted part 2 (and here's part 1) that I felt a need to explain the point of these posts again. My own experience is I thought this would be one post, and I was surprised when I finished part two that there was plenty for a part 3.
That's a good thing.
What got me to finally get on this today is something I just learned, and that I'm pretty sure is not common knowledge, but should be. Ever wondered why the Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964, but the Voting Rights Act was passed separately in 1965? Because the only way to get the Civil Rights Act past the conservative (including the dixiecrats who make up the base of the modern GOP) filibuster was to drop voting rights. Voting rights? And we thought dropping the public option was tough! But voting rights got through the next year, so don't anyone despair about having to do things incrementally.
So let's get started, and I think I'll start with what I expect will be the most controversial silver lining (you can tell me in comments if I'm right), the things that went right in regard to war crimes, human rights and civil liberties.
Minnesota's foremost proponent of torture, Robert Delahunty may get off the hook. The University of Saint Thomas Law School professor may get off the hook because his collaborator on the infamous torture memo, John Yoo, may get off the hook as well. This memo was critical in the Bush Administration's rationalization that the Geneva conventions against torture didn't apply to people capture in the War on Terror.
The Holder Justice Department has filed a sweeping amicus brief in the Padilla v. Yoo case before the Ninth Circuit, seeking to make absolute the immunity granted Justice Department lawyers who counsel torture, disappearings, and other crimes against humanity. The case was brought by Jose Padilla, who claims that he was tortured as the direct result of memoranda written by Yoo, now a law professor at Berkeley. At this stage, the case does not address the factual basis of Padilla's claims, but documents that have been declassified by the Department of Justice make it clear that the charges have a firm basis in fact. Here's the portion of the opinion authored by a lifelong Republican, Bush-appointed judge that the Justice Department found so objectionable:
"Like any other government official, government lawyers are responsible for the foreseeable consequences of their conduct...."
The Holder Justice Department insists that they are absolutely not responsible, and that they are free to act according to a far lower standard of conduct than that which governs Americans generally. Indeed, this has emerged as a sort of ignoble mantra for the Justice Department, uniting both the Bush and Obama administrations.
(Harper's)
This is yet another instance of where Hope and Change meet the same ol' same old. Keith Olbermann discussed this on Countdown tonight with Jonathan Turley.
