Why Does GOP Candidate Scorn Supreme Court's Affirmation Of Right Of Habeus Corpus?

McCain Takes Gitmo Ruling Personally
Why Does GOP Candidate Scorn Supreme Court's Affirmation Of Right Of Habeus Corpus?
Andrew Cohen
June 15, 2008



(CBS) John McCain, the presumptive Republican nominee, told a crowd of supporters in New Jersey Friday that the Supreme Court’s latest Guantanamo Bay ruling is “one of the worst decisions in the history of this country.”

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The main reason for McCain’s strong language, however, is as personal as political.

Following the last Supreme Court ruling on this topic, which also struck down stubborn Administration detainee policies, the Senator (a Vietnam torture victim himself) invested no small amount of his own treasured (and well-earned) historical capital to try to broker a deal on the detainees.

And, in late 2006, he did.

It’s called the Military Commissions Act. It was a terrible idea from the very beginning, and it was one of two federal statutes undercut by the Justices last Thursday. It’s no wonder the nominee is taking the defeat personally.

After first insisting that federal law clearly and unambiguously outlaw “torture,” McCain suddenly caved to White House pressure on the MCA, allowing the Administration to insert into the law a clause that effectively allows (and, indeed, legally buttresses the efforts of) the executive branch to implement torture as a means of interrogation.

Without McCain’s pander, there would have been no bad law for the Court to strike down last week. Without McCain’s grandiloquent appeal to Democrats and moderates during that lame-duck session, there quite possibly might have been a better law that just might have passed its constitutional test this term.

McCain’s sell-out on the torture language is not the reason the Justices declared the MCA unconstitutional. It is not the reason why the detainees now have more access to federal courts than they did before. But it is emblematic of the larger and much more destructive, seven-year-long sell-out of the legislative branch in the legal fight against terrorism.

more...

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/06/15/opinion/courtwatch/main4181781.shtml

and without human rights for five years. Perhaps for him it was an enjoyable experience since no one expected him to think or make decisions.

I do hope someone brings this up during the debates.

McInsane is clearly a fascist and the deadly enemy of every American.

and will continue to be for or against whatever he is told to be for or against.

It still makes him our deadly enemy.

don't see how he'll be able to hide that for too long.

for a GOP leader. Look at Reagan. Look at Stupid. They get into the most trouble when they get guys who want to run things, like Nixon and Daddy Bush. They want affable dimwits who will take orders.

John, say it ain't so.

When the Supreme Court stated the detainees have a right to challenge their detention, it also diluted *'s and his party's claim to do ANYTHING to "protect" this country from "terrorists". Of course they defined what a terrorist is. And their supposed motivation to bypass the Constitution was purely safety was beyond challenge and reproach. And that's really all they had. And republicans knew democrats would not co-opt this concept/program.

The withholding of habeas corpus from detainees was meant as a warning for anyone else deemed a terrorist or enemy combatant. The "second" PATRIOT Act made provision for any of us to be accused and imprisoned indefinitely without the hope of being released or due process or even a right to see a lawyer.

If *, John McCain, and Newt have having fits over the Habeas Corpus decision, it's because they risk losing their power over the rest of us. It's never been about the detainees. It's been about controlling us.

the dim one. He supposedly worked hard for the passage of this, and dammit, he's mad 'cause he didn't get his way and it's been overturned {stomps foot furiously}. I see lots of similarities between these two.

But your analysis is spot on; a middle card in their house of cards was pulled. Who knows which one will make the whole house tumble?

And gawd forbid we're not terrified enough; that card was already pulled imo, not disputing the possibility they could rig the deck.

More proof they are in panic mode. More of the same bullshit that NOBODY wants!

McInsane & Chimperoni.

... he'd look doubleplus cool in jackboots and a charcoal gray uniform with double lightning bolts on the collar and a full-length leather top coat to complete the ensemble?

Maybe it's the monocle and riding crop that sets his simulated granite heart a-flutter.

Or maybe he's just exactly the kind of totalitarian asshole everybody thinks he is, just waiting to step into all that unitary executive power and flip the switch to inaugurate Amerika v2.0: The end of the great democratic experiment(tm).

Because sure as hell, if the RNC manages to steal this one too, that's what's in store for this country.

Or maybe not... I like the odds, though.


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