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Dismembering Justice

In my last article on the torture conducted by the Bush administration, I may have left out another important reason for a full and complete reckoning for all involved at every level of government. It was in my last article I explained why I understand that Obama won't prosecute the agents that carried out the torture. To reiterate, we need our agents in the field to be able to do their jobs without worrying about the outcome of the next election and whether their actions will become unpopular.

However, of course that was the plan of the Bush administration all along. It now appears that from the beginning they planned on denying any responsibility for the torture by arguing that they had only asked how far they could go legally and it was the nefarious Department of Justice that told them to torture. Though, the new information seems to indicate that those lawyers were pressured to produce opinions that indicated torture was legal.

Given the amount the DOJ was politicized by the Bush administration it is highly unlikely that any advisory opinion that emanated from that DOJ was free of undue influence. Also, why would the DOJ have generated this opinion if it werent asked? And why would the question have been asked if it werent abundantly clear what the "correct" answer was?

Though if you believe the story being sold to us by the former administration through MSM is true, that every lawyer "consulted" by the Bush administration agreed that the techniques were legal, that does not make it so. The DOJ does not make the law. Congress makes the law. And Congress has made torture illegal. As I have explained in my previous article, waterboarding and the other techniques used were and still are torture.

Republicrats: Shifts Toward Blue

Why do my favorite Supreme Court Justices keep retiring? First it was Rehnquist, then O'Connor, now Souter. They were my favorites for writing intelligible opinions. Lawyers learn to write and use language partly to obscure their meaning. These justices seem to indicate to me that it is possible to be a brilliant and principled legal scholar and still be capable of being understood.

This would be my only comment at Souter's announcement of his impending retirement except for the political cast it takes on given the defection of Arlen Specter to the Democratic party which also occurred this week.

This article picks up on the greater significance that this has for the Republican party, especially given Specter's admission that the Republican party today is not the one he joined when he defected from the Democratic party. Like most of ABC's reporting it misdiagnoses the state of public opinion.

ABC paints this as being a division between moderates in power and conservative ideologues. I think this makes the inexplicable mistake of lumping fiscal and social conservatives together as one group. Well, i suppose it is not entirely inexplicable since this is the fundamental misconception of Karl Rove's political strategy that is misconstrued as appealing to the base.

Clearly the idea of going after the base is meant to be cast in contrast to Reagan's "Big Tent," particularly after the separation of the Libertarian wing of the party under Perot. But those of us who are truly Libertarian, not just fiscally but socially as well, understood Karl Rove's strategy as one of appealing to hot button right wing extremist issues that were rarely voted on before.

This whole strategy of appealing to people based on irrelevant emotional issues such as religion, national security, and immigration creates a misconception that conceals the true voting motives of "Blue Dog Republicans." This was something both Clinton and Obama picked up on in the last election and is why Ohio and Pennsylvania went blue. Sure there were narrow margins but it is illustrative of the problem of confusing propaganda with substance. The campaign propaganda to the MSM claimed these people were the base of the republican party but in truth you can only get so far by appealing to base and divisive emotions.

Now the Republican party is saddled with the burden of politicians that were elected for running socially right wing campaigns in a place and time when that would fly. This segment of the party is going to remain entrenched in its black and white social issues and while they may eventually learn to understand general notions of governance their presence at the table is going to continue to confuse the party at large about what went wrong in the last few elections.

In a political system where those that represent the people are forced to choose between two ridiculous characters of public opinion this does a tremendous disservice to real people who won't be stuffed into one of the two categories by Fox or MSNBC.

Guns on the Border

With people turning to gun violence during times of desperation and with the recession increasing incidents of desperation the MSM has been covering incidents of gun violence frequently lately. Of course in the MSM this topic always is an opportunity to discuss gun control. At the same time the Obama administration has been discussing gun control in relation to Mexican drug cartel violence on the border. In the MSM this leads to discussions that assume the return of the Brady Ban. I get the feeling that this is a wag the dog situation. Especially since it seems that reports in the MSM of violence on the boarder are inflated beyond all proportion.

My suspicions are raised even more that the MSM is just getting their gun control rocks off when Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano says that a renewed assault weapons ban would not be effective in reducing Mexican drug cartel violence.

Feingold's Proposed Amendment to the Constitution

Gun Control in Washington D.C. - No, This isn't a Repeat

I had previously remarked about the bill moving through Congress that would give full voting rights to Eleanor Holmes-Norton (D-D.C.). In those comments I also remarked that it was interesting that John McCain was voting against more equal representation of the nations citizens on what appears to be party lines because the seat is expected to be solidly Democratic. People have tried to throw a red herring into this debate by claiming that only states can be represented in Congress. Which is an interesting academic debate from a legal perspective but in reality is a smoke screen for partisan bickering. I find it hard to believe that anyone actually has a principled stance on the nature of the state when it comes to representation in Congress like they do about gun control or abortion. It's a politicians issue and I seriously doubt that framing the issue in this way will get any traction.

To be sure, the Republicans aren't the only ones with partisanship dirt on their hands. The Democrats brought this up because they wanted the extra seat, and threw in the extra seat for Utah as a token gesture. That seat is likely to be just as solidly Republican but Utah was due that seat in 2000 and would be getting it in 2011 anyway after the next census so really, the Democrats aren't giving the Republicans anything of similar value to what they are attempting to give themselves. Still for me this is a freedom and democratic representation issue.

The real fun came in last week when the Republicans dusted off their old roadblock issue, gun control. This article comes from the same ignorant perspective that most MSM coverage of guns has but covers some interesting angles on the nature of gun politics in the Capitol. It pisses me off that in their effort to be as childish and partisan as possible the Republicans are dragging gun control into the mix. Sure it worked, but bringing an unrelated issue into the debate was crass and only indicates that these Republicans don't take a principled stand on anything. It's all politics.

The thing that pisses me off about this is that there is a legitimate reason for the Republicans to bring this up but they don't see it. They don't see it because they don't care about the Second Amendment. All they care about is political power and what they can get away with.

The real issue is the 5-4 decision in Heller. For gun rights Heller is Roe v. Wade. Heller affirmed that the Second Amendment protects the right of the individual to keep a pistol independent of any militia. That is a reasonably narrow interpretation but D.C. interprets the holding even more narrowly to only mean that individuals may keep a loaded single action pistol in their home. Which would mean a definition of "firearm" that is even more restrictive than the now expired Brady Bill and would mean that it is illegal to transport a firearm in any kind of working order. Lots of people on the abortion issue are eyeballing the Supreme Court and not just because of Justice Ginsburg's recent illness. (may she always be healthy and live to be 100) If D.C. can argue for their narrow interpretation successfully or if the balance of The Court shifts, the triumph of gun rights will have been short lived and the jubilation of gun nuts will turn to rage. Federal preemption of further suit by the fascists in D.C. will preserve the rights of law abiding citizens and help close a chapter of wasteful, ineffective, and unconstitutional legislation.

The Ben Franklin Report: Tax Revenue

California state Assemblyman Tom Ammiano, Democrat, introduced a bill in that state's legislature proposing the legalization and taxing of recreational use of marijuana. Ammiano's arguments immediately touched on all the major points that the pro-legalization crowd has been making in between bong hits for decades now. To me the most significant argument is the fiscal one.

Legalization of a nonviolent activity lowers the number of criminals, reduces police costs of pursuing recreational pot smokers, reduces numbers of criminals in prison, reduces prison costs, eliminates need for violence in pot buying transaction and so reduces violent crime, brings marijuana production into the light of day where it can be regulated which produces tax revenue and regulation, regulation of production and use and quality has health benefits, which further reduce costs to society, and creates jobs.



Sure its not a new argument and it is the one that most young potheads are likely to jump on first because it seems like it would be so appealing to the forever cash-strapped government. "Lets just let them tax pot and then they will rush to make it legal, man." The major proponents of such thinking being in a chemically induced type-B personalities, rarely get any traction in mainstream politics. In trying economic times such as these I would expect a well reasoned argument that points out, not only the increased tax revenue ($1 billion in California alone) but also the potential cost savings in other programs, would get a better reception.

However, these arguments have failed before and its not because they are poorly reasoned, despite my poking fun at potheads. There are the usual histrionics that are thrown about by the anti-drug lunatics about the impending collapse of society, and "Oh God, won't somebody please think of the children!?!!?!" Despite the truth that legalized recreational drugs do lead to negative health consequences, and beer and tobacco companies do target children with advertising, those are threats that have proven to be small and that we as a society have obviously chosen to live with. It is also popular to point out that history(the repeal of prohibition, Amsterdam) has shown us that when certain recreational drugs are legalized it eliminates the demand in the informal market for the goods, which directs the attention of professional criminals to other activities. Then the reduction of interaction between normal Joe Sixpack (Johnny Jointsmoker?) people and hardened criminals and the police reduces violent crime. All of this is still to leave out the potential beneficial impact on our foreign relations.

I suspect that the main reason this type of legislation fails time and time again is that it has to be voted on by politicians. Politicians who can count votes. It doesn't matter how many potheads and marijuana activists get together because their voice will still be marginalized in the minds of the elected officials. It's hard to be taken seriously when the thing you are advocating for is illegal and all you want it for is recreation. (Hence the medical marijuana movement) The other reason elected officials will never vote for legalization of recreational marijuana is that they don't want to have their name associated with the downfall of society if all the histrionics of the sour-faced Republican old lady's turns out to be true.

I am Libertarian, and there are two ways to look at the recreational marijuana issue from that perspective as long as you believe that marijuana smoking is no different than tobacco or alcohol use. There is the Ron Paul view that whatever you do with your body is none of my business as long as it doesn't affect me. Then there is the long term Ted Nugent view that says this does affect me because on the aggregate there will be societal health costs from the negative health impacts of drug use.

I suppose I fall into a third category that doesn't care. Sure there are health costs, but like I said above, there are social costs involved, but most social costs of marijuana are created by its illegality, the real social costs stemming from health and high driving when likened to tobacco and alcohol are clearly so minimal that our society has decided (and I agree) that the benefits of legalization outweigh the costs.

So why don't I smoke? There are various reasons but mostly its a political statement. In my experience pot smokers can tend to get over enthusiastic about their recreational drug of choice and become zealous advocates of its use, and distrust those that do not. Sure, this could easily be because it makes one paranoid, but just being in the room makes you just as arrested when the cops show up. My true friends respect me even if they don't respect my decision and offers to partake are made out of common politeness arising from commensality. (After all, what can be a more ritualistic "breaking of bread" than a shared consumption of something that not only involves shared risk but that gives a spiritual sense of significance?) Still, my reflexive aversion to perceived peer pressure, my history of refusal that has lasted so long it has become part of my identity, combined with what I fear is addictive behavior continue to keep me away even though I think legalization of recreational use of marijuana would be a good thing for the country.

I will leave you with this video a friend posted to Facebook.

Moving Closer to Democracy

The Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs committee voted to give full voting rights to the Washington D.C. House seat today. For some time now their license plates have read "No taxation without representation." Referring to their lack of representation in Congress. It's interesting to see McCain voting against this Democratic seat as if party politics were the primary consideration.

Weaseling Out of Things

With the new year and the change of administration in Washington there has been a tendency lately for retrospective looks at the outgoing Bush administration which has reminded us of all that has gone wrong in the last eight years and all that the Bush administration and its collaborators have to answer for. This tendency has in turn provoked the apologists for the Bush regime who are now using the unitary executive theory as a shield rather than a spear. The result is conversations like the one on the Diane Rehm show this morning where lawyers acting as apologists for the nefarious acts of Bush policy sound like panicky weasels trying to slip out of anyone having to take responsibility for the wrongs they have done. These pundits try to appear to be centrists, but the way they use arguments regarding pragmatic politics to evade moral accusations that there has been wrongdoing on the part of the Bush administration paints these men as the worst caricature of the sleazy lawyer.

His Imperial Majesty, Emperor Norton I, Emperor of these United States and Protector or Mexico.

One hundred and twenty nine years ago today, Emperor Norton passed away leaving this world a sadder and more mundane place without him. Without trying he brought more unity, peace, and mirth to this world then most men of a hundred times his means. We should all strive to be like his Imperial Majesty. All hail the Emperor!

Spying On The Innocent

This article details some of the absurdity of the Maryland terrorism list wherein peaceful people who never committed any crime and never planed to do so were labeled as terrorists. Remember, people still claim that the president has the power to indefinitely detain a U.S. citizen living in the United States after merely labeling them an enemy combatant. A term the government was unable to define even at the Supreme Court. Also remember that the people detained as enemy combatants are tortured prior to determination of guilt or complicity in any criminal act.

We don't have any examples yet of someone being detained and tortured merely for exercising their First Amendment rights by expressing a liberal opinion and hopefully we will never see any. This is still the danger we have to be aware of when a government takes these kinds of powers for itself. The above article details how intelligence that repeatedly says these people were not dangerous leads to them being labeled as terrorists and in many cases misidentifies what these people were involved with and where they were. If these cops really thought these people were terrorists and a danger to the country I would hope that they would be more careful with the information they gather so as to actually know where someone was on a certain day rather then place them on the opposite side of the continent. Here we are seven years after 9/11 and we still haven't learned the lessons about putting quality people between us and the enemy and not wasting time and taxpayer dollars on witch hunts.

Prop. 8

I am not a citizen of California, so I have not been following the news surrounding Prop. 8. I don't even know the technical wording of what it does. I recently read this article, and it reminded me of something I have tried to address in previous postings. The idea that there can be a status equivalent to marriage for homosexuals that simply uses a different word. I have explained before that separate is not equal and that there are technical differences in the law that would be difficult to account for in creating a parallel civil institution.

I would like to try to address the underlying argument that if homosexuals are allowed to marry it somehow damages the sacred unions of heterosexual marriage. To me this seems like saying that every time I have a bacon cheeseburger, it harms every Jew that keeps kosher. Sure they might feel left out at a BBQ, but bacon is still delicious. OK, so the analogy needs work. I have yet to hear any reasoned argument behind the bare assertion, other than a veiled suggestion that the purpose of marriage is to produce future taxpayers. That upsets me as a Libertarian, but as a moral human being this concept throws me into a foaming rage that a human child is being valued only as a walking wallet. I think it shows that these people who claim to be for morality and the family are really the most cynical and selfish, if you only press them beyond their memorized talking points.

Personally I find it hard to argue with Mormons on the issue of family because they have such a strong family ethos and make it a central tenant of their religion. My bone of contention with them is that their conception of "family" is so narrow, it excludes and even rejects some of the diversity on Earth and in society that must be a part of God's plan. A faith that has a de facto exclusion of the childless and infertile, and an outright hostility to homosexual families seems to me to be directly rejecting the spark of divinity inherent in every part of God's Creation.

Gay Marriage In Connecticut

It should be obvious that anyone that is against gay marriage holds such an opinion because they don't like the idea of gay sex. Although we joke in popular culture that sex and marriage have nothing to do with each other, you won't see any significant principled division between the people who object to homosexuality and those who wish to deprive homosexuals of their civil rights.

Today Connecticut's supreme court ruled that denying same-sex couples the right to marry violated that state's constitution. Effectively becoming the third state to allow homosexual marriage.

Something that is often glossed over in discussions of gay marriage is the issue of civil unions. These are often touted as being the same as marriage but with a different name. Gay rights groups often do a good job of pointing out that "separate is not equal," but it gets a bit more technical than that. There is a certain deference that is given to the status of marriage in American law that would not transfer over to any artificial legislative construction. You can make a statute that gives persons in a civil union the same tax benefits(penalties), the same visitation rights, and same property ownership as marriage and these are the rights typically cited by people discussing the issue, but there are a number of other rights that most people don't know come from marriage. You can have joint ownership of property but what about inheritance? What about the "Marital Privilege" where your spouse can not be forced to testify against you in court? There are a number of others but the point is that the status of marriage is so ingrained in our culture that a legislature would have to rewrite its entire civil code to create a substantially similar civil status to marriage.

Which still leaves the question of motive. Why would you go to all the effort to create something exactly like marriage just for the gays if not to keep them separate? I have yet to have heard a coherent explanation of why conservatives believe that it somehow harms their marriage if homosexuals are allowed to marry. My wife and I may have had less sex, or poor communication on the week California first allowed gay marriage, but I guarantee you it was not the cause.

America Keeps Inching Back Toward Justice

There have been some gains for freedom and for the American people lately that have been overshadowed by the free fall in the stock market. The important thing is that these small steps show that our system still works, even if it draws its inspiration from molasses.

The Justice Department has completed its investigation into the firings of the nine U.S. attorneys and decided that since the Bush administration refused to cooperate with its investigation, Justice would appoint a special investigator. Whether this new investigator will have the power to get the information required to get to the bottom of this remains to be seen, and whether any power given will be effective is a whole other question.

Yesterday, U.S. District Judge Ricardo Urbina ordered the release of the Uighers into the United States. What is significant about this ruling is that last part about being released into the U.S. These are Chinese Muslims that were captured in Pakistan during the early days of the war in Afghanistan. The U.S. government has not considered them "enemy combatants" for some time now but will not release them into the United States and will not send them back to China. So the Government has been looking for, and failing to find, any country that will take them in. As with any promising ruling, there are still many appeals to go through.

Surveillance

I just thought I would try to document all the cameras I pass in a normal day. There were twenty three that I noticed but was unable to get pictures of. I could use this series of images to try to make a point about how we have become so desensitized to constant surveillance that it should not have been surprising that few people were outraged by the warrentless wiretapping. One thing I would like to point out is that these images were taken in Ohio during "golden week" where voters could register and vote in the same place at the same time a month early, and that some of the cameras that I noticed but was unable to get pictures of were in areas where people were exercising this right.

Free The West Memphis Three

Finally some real news. Judge William R. Wilson Jr., the judge who sent Echol's appeal back to Arkansas State court has recused himself. A second article provides some details of Jason Baldwin's appeal based on the argument that his lawyer represented him poorly during the original trial. The quoted text seems like Paul Ford, Baldwin's original defense lawyer, is cooperating in a genuine attempt to get an innocent man out of prison, and is doing so without hubris.

Free The West Memphis Three

Judge Burnett denied the request for a new trial for the WM3. He sided with the prosecution who argued that there being no DNA evidence at the crime scene did not prove the innocence of the convicted. Though if the Paradise Lost documentaries are to be believed there was no actual evidence connecting the three to the crime in the first place. If I understand the process correctly, the next step is to appeal to the Arkansas Supreme court and then to federal court. Unfortunately this could go on for some time.

Flagrant Fascism Fronts RNC Convention

Instead of waiting for scenes of peaceful protesters being outnumbered and surrounded by riot control police, or being sprayed with a pepper spray cannon that looks like a fire extinguisher, or being callously shoved to the ground as was the case in Denver, the police in the greater Minneapolis/St. Paul area have been proactive in suppressing potential problems. Instead, they have staged a series of raids on houses and meeting places of potential protesters, and confiscated computers and written materials. Of those arrested so far, the only charge that has been brought forth is a constitutionally questionable charges of "conspiracy to incite a riot." The St. Paul police spokesman Tom Walsh said that the cause for the search warrants that police were executing is not public at this time. Also targeted in the raids were journalists from other parts of the country in the area to cover the protests.

The group targeted, the RNC Welcoming Committee, which describes itself as "anarchist/anti-authoritarian," was described by Ramsey County Sheriff Bob Fletcher as "a criminal enterprise made up of 35 self-described anarchists...intent on committing criminal acts before and during the Republican National Convention."

For a bit of editorializing, the police are engaged in an active campaign to block freedoms of speech and assembly, which form the cornerstone of representative democracy is unabashedly loathesome. The fact that only a handful of those detained have been arrested is a clear indication that the authorities in Ramsey County are limiting their actions to those which rest in the ambiguous grey margins of the law, as evidenced by use of the 'conspiracy to commit riot' charges.

Tazer Follow Up

That guy that was tazered on his own couch by the cops that broke into his apartment and continued to tazer him after he identified himself, ya he just got a settlement of $100,000. Too bad that after paying his lawyer and the taxes on that shit he will only see $40,000.

The important thing to remember is the cost of justice. The officers that did this will not face justice for their actions but the taxpayers of this burrow will be the ones that have to pay for the actions of the persons that they have stuffed into uniform. This is why every individual in the community should care about the quality of the police officers on their streets.

The Security Situation

For those of you dealing with apologists for the foolish security measures of the Bush administration here are two direct examples of why innocent people do have something to fear from draconian security measures such as those that have already been enacted. Not only were these people not doing anything wrong, two of them fought to defend our freedoms.