This is America
From today's press briefing.
Helen, you've had your hand up, sorry.Q I wanted to talk about the bill the President will sign tomorrow.
Q It makes him a final arbiter on torture.
.
posted by mikevotes at
6:14 PM
6 Comments:
Did we just reach the point where America stopped being a land of laws and is now a land of kings?
By
-epm, at 7:53 PM
That's what I saw. That's why I clipped it.
There wasn't any argument or challenge to this.
It was stated and accepted as a given.
Mike
By
mikevotes, at 10:37 PM
It's pretty simple really. If he is the final arbiter of torture...then we have his ass right there for being responsible for it when it comes down to war crime time...and it will...some day. They think they have this stuff all right and tidy...but I think down the road the Constitution will rally herself up some whoop-ass! Signing statements or not...he's in the cross-hairs.
By
sumo, at 3:58 AM
Oh, but this legislation makes everything legal. It contains that hideous retroactive immunity which I don't think can be challenged.
However, the actions going forward might be at risk if the law is deemed unconstitutional, similar to the jeopardy being faced in the wiretapping cases.
(They are trying to stick an immunity clause in that legislation as well.)
Mike
By
mikevotes, at 7:06 AM
Bush may be retroactively shielded by this legislation, but I can envision a time when the whole mystique of Bush falls from grace in the American zeitgeist (if it hasn't already).
nWhen the dust all settles on this, and the Bush Years fall under the glaring eye of historians, I call also envision an embolden world community who may make it difficult for Bush to travel freely to some parts of the developed world as he will have been found to have violated international laws and thus bound to a higher standard than the appeasement congress of the 21st century.
Good thing for Bush he has no interest in the world outside his bank account.
By
-epm, at 9:08 AM
In the past, Rumsfeld avoided Germany at one point because of an open case. It was politically dismissed, but still.
And there are countries where Kissinger is still afraid to travel.
I do think the legal battles over presidential authority will be a major event when looked back on historically. It will be one of the major features in the historical landscape in a hundred years.
The way we still talk about the sedition act.
Mike
By
mikevotes, at 10:50 AM
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