SOFA News

It appears that the SOFA so long in the works has passed the Iraqi Parliment. Juan Cole,

Reuters reports that the Iraqi parliament passed the US-Iraqi security agreement, which stipulates that all US troops will be out of Iraq by 2011. of 275 members of parliament, 198 attended and 145 voted in favor. That means it barely passed from the point of view of an absolute majority, though it was a clear simple majority. Apparently the al-Maliki government bowed to Sunni Arab demands that the agreement be submitted to a national referendum, California-style. If that is true, it is possible that it could still be rejected by the Iraqi people. But al-Maliki got it through parliament by painting opponents as implicitly opposing a US withdrawal, and that campaign tactic may work with the general public, too.

The key to whether the populace ends up voting for this will be the spin attached. If al-maliki is able to present this as the best way to get the troops out then there is a decent chance it passes. The Iraqi's want the US out and whichever side is able to make their side the withdrawal side is going to win.

Back home it is not right that there is no official english translation available. It is not right that the congress does not get to revue this. A lame duck president widely despised and who might go down in history as the worst president ever has committed the US to three more years of an unpopular war without allowing for debate or even review of the terms.

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A New Hobby of Hate: Beaner Hopping

Note: All events are alleged and accused are innocent until proven guilty.

There are some things i fail to understand. Random acts of violence against minorities being one of them. Its hard for me to understand the motivation behind, say, driving around with your friends and assaulting hispanic people. What on earth does that gain anyone? Sadly this appears to be what happened in Long Island.

Here are the events as alleged by the prosecution in the case,

Mr. Spota said three defendants, Anthony Hartford, Kevin Shea and Jose Pacheco, all 17, went out driving five days before Mr. Lucero was killed with the intent of, in their words, “beaner hopping.”

They found a Hispanic man that day whom Mr. Pacheco admitted to punching and knocking out cold, Mr. Spota said. That victim has not stepped forward. Mr. Pacheco later told the police, “I don’t go out and do this very often, maybe once a week,” Mr. Spota said.

About 5 a.m. on Nov. 8, Nicholas Hausch and Jordan Dasch, both 17, fired a BB gun at Marlon Garcia, hitting him several times. In the evening, the seven friends got together and, after failing to find potential victims in Medford, set off for Patchogue, where they saw Hector Sierra walking downtown. They caught up to him and punched him before he ran away.

Shortly before midnight, the teens saw Mr. Lucero and his friend, Angel Loja. They got out of their car and taunted the men with racist slurs. Mr. Loja fled, but the group surrounded Mr. Lucero and punched him in the face. Trying to defend himself, Mr. Lucero removed his belt and swung it, striking Mr. Conroy in the head. Enraged, Mr. Conroy rushed at Mr. Lucero and plunged a knife into his chest. The youths fled, but were soon caught by the police.

Mr. Conroy was the only one charged with murder, Mr. Spota said, because the other six defendants were initially unaware that he had stabbed Mr. Lucero.

There are several important things in this story. The first is that the boys are being charged with hate crimes. Hate crimes are an interesting idea because they essentially make some murders worse than others. That strikes me as a strange concept. Do we really value human life more based on certain thought process? Are people going to be less inclined to commit hate based offenses because we make the penalties harsher? I really doubt that those who act out of hate are going to be deterred by increased penalties.

The second thing that strikes me as strange here is that one of the accused, Chris Kirby, is of hispanic decent. That makes his alleged hate crime a hispanic person attacking a hispanic person out of hate. Maybe that right but to me it seems odd. It makes me wonder whether what was happening here is a "hate" crime or merely a crime of bullies picking on people considered less powerful in society. By picking on hispanics they had the increased probability that the people they attacked would not report them. This is in fact what occurred,

Every now and then, perhaps once a week, seven young friends got together in their hamlet of Medford, on eastern Long Island, to hunt down, and hurt, Hispanic men. They made a sport of it, calling their victims “beaners,” a reference to the staple Hispanic dish of rice and beans, prosecutors said on Thursday.
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“We know for sure that there are more victims out there.”

It just happened that this time they killed a man. Not only that but the man they killed had family, family he worked hard to support. Specifically this man was a 16 year resident of the united states who worked at a dry cleaners to send money to his ailing mother in Ecuador.

Tragically the role of hate crimes charges are likely to become increasingly relevant. In times of economic hardship as jobs become more scarce those at the bottom end of the income spectrum are placed in greater and greater economic competition. In the past this has led to increases in violence against minorities and other groups viewed as outsiders.

I doubt that there is a way to eliminate crimes based on hate as long as that hate exists generally in society. Until that happens we need to make sure that those who commit crimes against people due to race, gender, sexual identity, disability etc are brought to justice. We should do this because these people need to be brought to justice for their crimes, hate based or not. If what is alleged is true these kids did something pretty sick and the penalties should be severe whether it was against all hispanics or all whites.

There is a question about whether it is justified to aggravate a crime based on thought as i discussed earlier in the post. I will concede that that is not the justification for why hate crimes are punished more severely. The idea behind it is that the crime is against not the sole person or society in general but the select historically oppressed group. Due to this other dynamics come into play like the possibility of racial strife breaking out. To minimize this the justice system highlights the fact that those communities can feel like they gt justice by adding punishment on top of the crimes as a signal to the victimized group that the power structure is paying attention.

I am not sure that truly washes in practice, that punishing someone for the killing because they did it in hate and punishing them because killing is wrong brings any more justice. However in general if society feels that aggravating punishment because of hate is morally right and necessary it is hard to argue against it.

One thing that hate crime legislation has the potential to do that i am in complete agreement with is allow for the Federal Government to step in and prosecute and assist in cases where the local government is unable an unwilling to act. That i think is something that would increase the justice for those who commit crimes based on hate. Unfortunately, the legislation that would have made a great step forward in this area failed to make it out of the senate this last congress. Bush's veto threat and the fact it was attached to the Department of Defense (DoD) Authorization bill are blamed for the failure of the legislation.

Enacting legislation that allows for the federal government to step in when locals are incapable of prosecuting hate crimes is just one more task left to president obama. Just imagine if the alleged events that took place in long island where overlooked because the victims were hispanic. No one could claim that is justice for Mr. Lucero.

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Bailout Financial but let the Auto's fail?

Look i know that the Auto industry is not the poster child for intelligent business model and that the ceo's who came to the hill to beg were stupid to do so in private jets but the scrutiny given to the Auto industry is actually pretty extraordinary when compared to the financial sector. Especially considering that the auto sector probably provides more jobs when its all counted up.

Part of this is that everyone has been pissed at the auto club for a while because they have undermined CAFE standards and produced bloated SUV's. The other is that the south had those union free auto plants that they want more of. The final part is that the financial people are more than happy to give oversight free bags of money to their friends who they know deserve it lest the entire world crumble.

I actually dont oppose putting some steele strings on this bail out money for autos but i would like to see the same response given to those companies like citi who come begging for money and seem to get it instantly.

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Frist ICC War Crimes Trial to Occur

In light of all the domestic and other international problems that are going on right now the first international war crimes trial to be held by the International Criminal Court (ICC) has received almost no media attention here in the US. This is rather unfortunate as America is supposed to be a leader on human rights. Of course this reputation has taken a well deserved hit over the last eight years but in many ways the causes of that decline should raise awareness not decrease it. America has a rocky history with the court and we have decided not to sign on to it out of sovereignty concerns regarding possible modifications required to the constitution. As a result we must look on as bystanders at the courts first trial, that of Thomas Lubanga Dyilo.

Lubanga is charged with he recruitment of child soldiers into his Union des Patriotes Congolais (UPC) and its militia, the Forces Patriotiques pour la Libération du Congo. As his trial is the first for the ICC the court has been debugging itself dealing with procedural issues. Two of the most important of these issues are the participation of victims and the procedures for dealing with confidential and secret documents provided as evidence.

The participation of victims has not been previously allowed in the three previous war crimes tribunals, International Criminal Tribunals for Rwanda and for the former Yougoslavia, the Special Court for Sierra Leone. Victim participation is an important step for the trials. One of the most important factors in the success of the trials will be the backing of the victimized peoples. these people need to feel as though the trials are just and done with them and for them. Otherwise they lack a legitimacy and an important force in moving forward in international human rights and law. Victims testifying should be similar in nature to any trial where the victim takes the stand and there is no compelling reason, imo, to forbid it as long as their victim hood is established. Victims testifying can only help the population to feel like it is their justice and not something done simply to assuage foreigners guilt or sensibilities.

The second procedural issue deals with confidential evidence.

Shortly before Lubanga’s trial was scheduled to begin in 2008, the Trial Chamber of the ICC found fault with the prosecutor’s proposed use of evidence collected by the UN and NGOs. The evidence was in some 200 documents that could contain exculpatory material that might help the defense prove Lubanga’s innocence. These were documents the prosecutor had obtained on a confidential basis. The court ruled that the prosecutor should share the evidence with the Trial Chamber and the defense. Since the prosecutor did not immediately have permission to share the documents, the Trial Chamber canceled the trial and halted the proceedings.

Tuesday the stay was lifted after the prosecution agreed to allow the defense access to the evidence. The problem as a little more complicated than simple access to the documents Article 67 of the Rome Statute requires the prosecutor to allow the defense access to evidence in his possession that “tends to show the innocence of the accused, or to mitigate the guilt of the accused, or which may affect the credibility of prosecution evidence.” ICC judges found that Moreno-Ocampo had incorrectly relied on a provision in Article 54 of the Statute, under which he may agree not to disclose confidential information obtained “solely for the purpose of generating new evidence.”

The importance of proper and complete discovery cannot be overstated. One of the biggest complaints against the military commissions set up to try the detainees at Guantano Bay is the lack of complete disclosure of the evidence to the defense. Defense lawyers and prosecutors alike have walked away from the trials because of the governments refusal to grant the defense access to exculpatory evidence. Legitimate courts reveal the evidence that may support the defendants innocence. with out the procedure the ICC loses legitimacy completely in the eyes of any nation reluctant to participate. From there it is a short step to the failure of the institution.

The trial of Lubanga will be closely watched in many parts of the world and it should be no different in the US. The trial holds important consequences for the future of international human rights and justice.

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Don't Fear the Lieberman

Terence Samuel at TAP has a piece up on why allowing Lieberman to retain his job as head of Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs is not such a big problem. The heart of the argument is that Lieberman has been boxed in by Obama and the Dems grand gesture of magnanimity,

Where will Lieberman's "independence of mind" lead him next?

My suspicion is nowhere, because whatever vestiges of self-respect Lieberman had left fell away entirely this week. At least standing beside McCain as firmly as he did -- under intensely hostile fire from Democrats -- made him seem, in his own way, courageous and principled. For him to now say, "I didn't mean it," that it was just the "heat of the campaign" seems craven and weak.

Still the narrative that emerged this week was that Lieberman's shape-shifting abilities had saved him yet again. He was the survivor. But while he will chair a powerful and important committee, Lieberman has no margin for error. While Harry Reid and Democrats -- salivating over the potential of having 60 filibuster-busting votes -- made their deal with the devil to preserve the possibility, Lieberman has tied his fate to the whims of a Democratic caucus that will regard him with an unstable mix of caution and suspicion. His days as a free agent are over.

Even if they get it, the 60-vote threshold will not be as critical as Democrats hope. But pretend for a moment that the undecided Senate races in Minnesota and Georgia turn in the Democrats' favor, and they get their 60 votes with Lieberman and Bernie Sanders. How often would Lieberman be allowed to defy the wishes of the party to follow his "independence of mind?"

Approximately none.

This is a solid reflection of the conventional wisdom formed around this incident. Of course it totally ignores the fact that lieberman is bad at his job. The man failed as committee chair. All that aside this article lacks something really important when talking about Joe Lieberman, what is going to motivate him to stay in line?

There is repeated mention that Joe has no margin for independence but no justification of why this is so. The implication is that if Joe acts out he gets booted but that is a much more difficult task than it seems. TO boot joe requires a floor vote vulnerable to a filibuster by the GOP and the optics look terrible. The dems try to bounce joe just when he looks like an independent watch dog conducting serious investigations into Obama's administration. Joe owed Obama before when he campaigned for him in 2006. Joe begged Obama to come help him out and he did. Joe repaid that with a big knife in the back.

The dems have no control over what Joe lieberman does despite all their protestations to the contrary. Joe is going to do what he feels like because he has correctly learned that there are no consequences for his actions. All will be forgiven in the name of "bi-partisanship".

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Disgraceful

The man is a politician convicted on 7 counts of corruption. I know he is old and its really tough to think of your elders as being bad in any way but he is corrupt. He violated the trust placed in him by the voters of Alaska. That the Senate can stand around and applaud corruption is just shocking and shameful.

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Victory for America

After the sad display by dems yesterday when they welcomed Joe Lieberman back into their club we get some good news. It appears that being a convicted felon does hurt your reelection chances. Ted Stevens lost in Alaska. this really is good news for everyone as the republicans dont have to deal with being officially branded the party of convicted felons, the dems dont have to cave to Ted on anything, and the people of alaska are less of a national joke. Not to mention we get another Dem in the Senate meaning were that much closer to seeing actual liberal or just non conservative policies enacted in this country. Congrats to Mark Begich.

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Dean Trys to Cover by Blaming Youth

Howard Dean did an interview with bloggers today that addressed the lieberman situation. He gave a bunch of ansers that were pretty weak tea but this is one i found very bad,

Well, people of my generation think yeah, damn right we should. But in this new spirit of reconciliation, which is why I think Barack Obama got elected by 66 percent of the under 35 vote, maybe if not (unintelligible) I'm very willing to give the benefit of the doubt to the Senators and to Barack Obama on that one. Do we want to have a big fight over what happens to Joe Lieberman? I don't think so. I think we want to have a big fight about whether we have a decent health insurance program or a renewable energy program.

Now being under 35 i feel qualified to voice my opinion on this idea. Making sweeping generalizations that young people would not want to see Joe Lieberman punished for lying and fear mongering misunderstands why Obama was elected. Obama was elected to restore competancy and accountability to the government and to clean up after the Bush Admin. Lieberman is one of those things that needs to be cleaned up. He failed in his job as head investigator of governmental affairs. The man is bad at his job and that is one of the biggest problems young people and people in general have with Bush he was bad at his job.

Also, Gov. Dean may want to consider that those young people voted overwhelmingly against a candidate who Joe Lieberman supported. They voted against Joe's ideas of what we need in a leader so in some way we did vote against Joe Lieberman when we rejected what he stood for. Dont use the youth as an excuse for your spinelessness.

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Lieberman My New Hero

I now admire Joe Lieberman in the way most people admire people who get away with everything bad they ever try. I wish i could escape punishment for half the number of transgressions that Joe Lieberman has made. Really is probably the best politician in washington right now. He can simply do whatever he wants. He fully understood the utter spineless nature of the Senate Dems. He must have realized that Senate Dems punishing Joe is like investment banks voluntarily regulating themselves, not gonna happen. Steve Benen makes a relevant post,

Second, let's pause to appreciate just how smart Lieberman is. In this case, I don't mean that as a compliment. It was inconceivable that if Obama won in a veritable landslide, while the Senate Democratic caucus grew by (at least) six seats, that Lieberman would not only get off scot-free, but would also be in a position to dictate to Democrats, without any leverage at all, which outcomes he found "unacceptable." If someone had predicted this scenario to me a month ago, I could have found it ridiculous. And yet, here we are.

Josh Marshall had a post back in June explaining, even before some of Lieberman's most outrageous conduct, that Lieberman was burning bridges that couldn't be rebuilt. "My assumption is that after the November election, regardless of the outcome of the presidential campaign, Joe will be stripped of his chairmanship," Josh said. I agreed wholeheartedly at the time. It was a no-brainer.

Except, it wasn't. Lieberman knows Senate Democrats better than Democratic voters do. My friend Matt told me via email yesterday, "If Lieberman ends up keeping his gavel on Homeland Security, I think we need to stop for a moment and recognize him as the smartest politician in Washington. He will have correctly made a bet about the fortitude of his Democratic colleagues in the Senate and he will have been right, against all apparent odds."

This is a decision, I suspect, that the caucus will regret in the not-too-distant future. It's predicated on the assumption that Lieberman really is a Democrat at heart.

He's not.

Watch the dems give back a huge number of seats in 2010. People did not vote to strip lieberman but they voted for a change and part of that change was accountability and a spine. clearly the dems dont appreciate that.

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No Honeymoon for Obama

The election of Barack Obama to the office of the presidency with the margin that occurred has sparked talk of a mandate. This has in turn sparked conversation about priorities and what obama is going to do first and how he is going to use the mandate before it runs out. The time frame given for Obama to get something done has merged with talk over Obama's first hundred days in office based on a "honeymoon period" where congress would be afraid to oppose such a popular president. This talk is wildly off base.

The American Prospect has an article up right now that discusses patience. Patience in acting and governing. It dovetails well with the point i am trying to make which is that Obama will not have a honeymoon period so he should not count on one but use his typical long term strategy to make the best out of his entire term.

Obama will need a full reservoir of that same patience in the White House, because he'll face similar frantic pressure and second-guessing. He will be surrounded by a crippling crowd of people and groups convinced that if their own No. 1 cause isn't enacted in the first 100 days, it will never happen. The conventional wisdom about the presidency is very much the same as the advice Obama was given in the primaries: Move quickly. Overwhelm the forces of the establishment. Use the momentum of the election to achieve the biggest things possible. You'll never be more powerful than on Jan. 21.
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For all the romance of Franklin D. Roosevelt's first 100 days, history suggests that presidents do not get a mandate as a mechanical function of their electoral margin, but in fact they build it over time. They earn it not by winning but by governing. They assemble coalitions and use them again and again, and build institutions and make them work. While many good policies and necessary emergency measures were passed in the first 100 days of the New Deal, the innovations that lasted -- those that defined politics until Reagan -- came later, after FDR had consolidated power, forced the Supreme Court to accept a new set of assumptions about government's role in the economy, and won the 1934 mid-term election. Similarly, Reagan did not win a decisive mandate for conservative policies in 1980; rather, like Obama, he was the beneficiary of a coalition made up of equal parts support for his conservatism and revulsion at the previous administration's incompetence. It was not until August 1981, when he assembled bipartisan coalitions to pass his budget- and tax-cutting plans, that Reagan can be said to have had a mandate for conservative policies.

This is not to say that there aren't things that need to be done immediately, such as economic stimulus, closing Guantánamo, and a plan to get out of Iraq. But the changes that will bring about a new political era call for a more patient and steady approach.

Like Roosevelt and Reagan, Obama has the opportunity to become what the political scientist Stephen Skowronek calls a "reconstructive leader," a type that he notes often follows a failed presidency. "John Adams and Thomas Jefferson, John Quincy Adams and Andrew Jackson, James Buchanan and Abraham Lincoln, Herbert Hoover and Franklin Roosevelt, Jimmy Carter and Ronald Reagan -- these repeated historical pairings ... suggest nothing so much as an intimate connection between manifest incapacity and towering success in presidential leadership," Skowronek wrote the year George W. Bush was elected. Reconstructive leaders "are party builders; they use their authority to consolidate a coalition that will support the new agenda and dominate electoral politics."

Obama is acutely aware of the need for careful planning to achieve success. He is constructing a team of people designed around legislating and governing. He is also an organizer at heart and good organizers understand the value of patience and laying a good foundation before acting. Current indicators point to Obama trying to do what the TAP article suggests, a party and national restructuring presidency.

I mention that Obama should not focus too much on the first 100 days because he is not likely to find that time period more friendly than any other. The GOP minority is committed to fighting him on pretty much everything. People like John Kyl are ready to try and filibuster any judicial nominee and are committed to fighting a bail out of the auto industry.

Senators Richard Shelby of Alabama and Jon Kyl of Arizona said it would be a mistake to use any of the Wall Street rescue money to prop up the automakers. They said an auto bailout would only postpone the industry’s demise.

“Companies fail every day and others take their place. I think this is a road we should not go down,” said Mr. Shelby, the senior Republican on the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee.

“They’re not building the right products,” he said. “They’ve got good workers, but I don’t believe they’ve got good management. They don’t innovate. They’re a dinosaur in a sense.”

Mr. Kyl, the Senate’s second-ranking Republican, added, “Just giving them $25 billion doesn’t change anything. It just puts off for six months or so the day of reckoning.”

There is no talk there of letting a president Obama go forward unopposed because he was just elected and we know the gop does not believe that obama has received a mandate,

When Franklin D. Roosevelt won his second term for president in 1936, the defeated Republican candidate, Gov. Alf Landon of Kansas, won only two states, Maine and Vermont, and Democrats controlled both houses of Congress by wide margins.

But Obama's win was nothing like that. He may have opened the door to enactment of the long-deferred liberal agenda, but he neither received a broad mandate from the public nor the needed large congressional majorities.

The Democrats fell several votes short of the 60-vote filibuster-proof Senate that they were seeking and also failed to get rid of a key Senate target: Republican leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.

Republicans, though discouraged by the election's outcome, believe Obama will be hard-pressed not so much to enact his agenda but to keep his popular majority, which he considers centrist, as he moves to enact ultra-liberal legislation, particularly the demands of organized labor.

Obama is going to have to fight the GOP every step of the way. He will take his time and map out a strategy that he best believes will deliver success over his entire term. he gets 4 years in office so why would he waste all but the first 100 days? he wont.

Obama is committed to long term thinking. Everyone has probably heard his quote about how we cant solve global warming with him changing his light bulbs. He views the solutions to our problems as solvable only through collective action sustained over time. Instant fixes are not sufficient to deal with out problems. The notion that Obama, a cautious and pragmatic person is going to commit to the first 100 days or bust idea is wrong. He has no honeymoon period so dont look to see him acting as if he does.

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Criminal Charges for Blackwater Guards

Zachary Roth at TPM is reporting on the possibility of Federal Charges for 6 Blackwater guards in relation to a shooting in Nisoor Square. The process seems to be in an early stage such that charges are unlikely. The possibility of actually charging Blackwater contractors for the actions they committed while in Iraq carries significant legal ramifications. It will shed light on an emerging and important doctrine of US foriegn and judicial policy, the extension of jurisdiction of domestic US courts over troops and civilians abroad.

Blackwater is not a particularly popular corporation here in America or abroad. One of the reasons that this is so is that is perceived that they operate with no rules an no oversight and are subject to no law. This makes for a very bad image not helped by the reports of events like the shootings at nisoor square. The damage done to America's reputation is not minor as Blackwater has been employed by the state department to the tune of $1.25 billion. However the department of justice seems to have taken note of the furor over the lack of legal oversight and has slowly begun to create a doctrine for criminal liability of civilian contractors in war zones.

Among the issues under discussion at the Justice Department is whether prosecutors have authority to bring the case. The largest security contractor in Iraq, Blackwater operates in a legal gray area. Its guards are immune from prosecution in Iraqi courts and U.S. law does not normally apply to crimes committed overseas.

To prosecute, authorities must argue that the guards can be charged under a law meant to cover soldiers and military contractors. Since Blackwater works for the State Department, not the military, it's unclear whether that law applies to its guards.

It would be the first such case of its kind. The Justice Department recently lost a similar case against former Marine Jose Luis Nazario Jr., who was charged in San Diego with killing four unarmed Iraqi detainees.

The law referenced in the quote is Military Extraterritorial Jurisdiction Act, passed by Congress in 2000, to address crimes allegedly committed in combat. Its original purpose was to catch soldiers like Nazario that managed to become discharged from the Army and are not in the reserves who are charged with crimes resulting from their time in service.

The relevant statutory language is

Whoever engages in conduct outside the United States that would constitute an offense punishable by imprisonment for more than 1 year if the conduct had been engaged in within the special maritime and territorial jurisdiction of the United States [1]while employed by or accompanying the Armed Forces outside the United States shall be punished as provided for that offense. 18 USC Sec. 3261(a)(1).

If we take a plain language reading of the statute then we have to look at whether the contractors charged were with the army at the time of the Nisoor Square shooting. They were not. This leaves the Justice Department in a bit of a bind. They have to hope that the courts take a broad view of what the term "accompanying" means to find that the jurisdiction extends to the Blackwater Guards under 3261. Do not count this broad interpretation out.

What we have going for us is the argument that public policy absolutely supports bringing Blackwater and other civilian contractors under jurisdiction of US courts. No one is above the law or outside the law and yet if the court rejects the interpretation that brings the contractors under US federal court jurisdiction that is what happens. The US mission in Iraq is undercut by having these contractors act without liability. Also, there is the impact on the troops who have to see these guys traipse about the country with immunity. Blackwater already pays better and now they would officially get to operate with criminal and civil immunity.

Another important point is that the Iraqi government is making a very big deal out of gaining jurisdiction over US soldiers for crimes while committed off duty. The ability to punish those who commit crimes in their country is important and showing that the US is willing to punish our citizens who commit those crimes sends a strong clear and positive message. The Iraqi's might not be so determined to gain jurisdiction if they felt that the alleged criminals were being tried and punished as the should be. That would help speed along the SOFA agreement still in the works.

One consequence of finding that US federal courts do have jurisdiction is that the guards would be tried in civilian courts for acts committed in a war zone. The result of the Nazario trial might indicate a general discomfort among civilians to judge the actions of those in a war zone.

"I don't think we had any business doing that," juror Nicole Peters said at the time. She wiped away tears after the August verdict and later hugged the defendant. "I thought it was unfair to us and to him."

This would have the consequence of rasing the level of proof that the prosecution has to meet. The prosecution would have to prove with a certainty that either the situation was not nearly as chaotic or dangerous as might be assumed or that even if it was dangerous that a soldier or security contractor would have been trained and capable of dealing with the danger in such a manner as to nullify it. Both are tough questions to ask of civilian jurors.

Note that this is groundwork is being laid before Obama takes office. Remember that it will not be completed before he does so even if the Bush admin is inclined to pass on this prosecution President Obama will probably be the one staffing the justice department making sure that political considerations do not interfere with seeking justice.

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Have Some Self Respect

When i read about the deliberation in the senate over whether or not to strip Joe Lieberman of his committee chairmanship i go through alternate feelings. First i get really angry. I mean this is a guy who campaigned against the nominee of the party. He questioned the man's patriotism and he has supported the worst of the power abuses over the last eight years. The man conducted no investigations into the katrina response or any other issue during the Bush presidency. He is one of the worst members of the senate and deserves nothing from the Dems. Yet, it appears he is going to retain his committee chair despite everything. This in turn makes me so sad. The dems really have that little self respect or care about principle that they are going to let this man retain a position of power after everything he has done. It is rather embarrassing in my opinion. Being a Dem apparently means nothing to them. Here is Glenn pointing out why we should hardly be surprised by this.

It is worth remembering that the Democrats who are going to exert dominant political control are the same ones who have provoked so much scorn -- rightfully so -- over the last several years, and particularly since 2006. This is the same Democratic Party leadership which funded the Iraq War without conditions (and voted to authorize it in the first place); massively expanded the President's warrantless eavesdropping powers; immunized lawbreaking telecoms; enacted the Patriot Act and then renewed it with virtually no changes; didn't even bother to mount a filibuster to stop the Military Commissions Act; refrained from pursuing any meaningful investigations of Bush lawbreaking; confirmed every last extremist Bush nominee, from Michael McConnell to Michael Mukasey; acquiesced to even the worst and most lawless Bush policies when they were briefed on them; and on and on and on. None of that has changed. That is still who they are.
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That is who Senate Democrats appear well on their way to selecting to serve as their Chairman of Homeland Security, of all committees. That's because nothing that Lieberman has done really bothers them. Endorsing the Iraq War and the full panoply of radical Bush policies isn't disqualifying in the least because so many of them also endorsed that and support it, or, at the very least, it's not a priority for them. They care even less what their "base" thinks, what the so-called "Left" wants. Few things in this world are less likely than them ever taking even a mild stand -- such as stripping Lieberman of his Chair -- in order to defend some sort of political principle, or to punish ineptitude, or to announce that there are certain lines to the Right that can't be crossed. They don't do that. They never have. And it shouldn't surprise anyone that they won't now.

Lets get some maddow in here...



How utterly pathetic.

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Iraq Making Painstakingly Slow Progress

A major fault line of Iraqi politics is the sectarian split between Sunni and Shia. After the brutal ethnic cleansing and hardening of tribal loyalties there exists great distrust between large portions of the populations. This distrust caused the minority Sunni to form their own militias and armed forces to fight against not only the American occupiers and the al queda forces operating in Iraq but to protect against Shia Iraqis. The drop in violence that accompanied the surge had many contributing factors and one of these was putting these Sunni forces onto the American payroll, paying them not to shoot at us and to fight on our behalf in some instances. Now as we prepare to leave Iraq there is concern over what happens to the 100,000 sunni we have been paying.

It appears that the melding of the 100,000 strong sunni force known as the son's of iraq is actually being integrated into the Iraq police force.

Iraq's ruling Shiites still view the fighters with suspicion. The hostility reflects the deep mistrust between the country's newly assertive Shiite majority and the onetime Sunni elite, who are angry about their fall from power. If the government alienates the Sunni paramilitary fighters, who number nearly 100,000 countrywide, the fighters could restart their insurgency.

But as the U.S. military prepares to start pulling out of the country, responsibility for the Sons of Iraq was transferred to the Iraqi army. The payments Monday marked the last step in the transition.

"Today's a tremendous day," said Brig. Gen. William Grimsley, deputy commander of the Army's 4th Infantry Division, whose area encompasses Baghdad. He and other U.S. military officials played down concerns expressed by many of the Sunni paramilitary members that the Iraqi government might renege on vows to find them jobs in the future. "We're not worried, necessarily, but it's something we all need to watch long-term," Grimsley said.

The first of the paydays is taking place at 36 stations in west Baghdad. All 21,000 of the paramilitary members in the area controlled by the Iraqi army's 6th Division are to be paid by next Monday.

Other provinces will soon follow. The integration is not perfect however as the sunni fighters have yet to be given a chance at any command or higher level positions. this has added to the distrust between the two camps. Freezing the sunni out of the officer corp is not a viable long term solution for a country struggling with sectarian violence. Segregation is not an effective way of reducing tensions between rival factions.

Keeping the pay coming is an important part of keeping the peace. Many fighters are happy with the money for now even though it represents a pay cut from the amount they were receiving from the americans, 300 down from 350. keeping young men with weapons employed and on your side is a good idea. By keeping them employed and maintaining the peace it offers a chance for a reconciliation. This should not be portrayed as a quick and simple process.

If we analogize to the civil rights movement and race relations in the US feelings of racial hatred receded only over decades as younger people who never experienced jim crow grew up and interacted with African Americans. Even now after electing a black president the lingering effects of racial divide were painfully evident. Is it so unreasonable to expect that it will take similar lengths of time to sure up and heal the cleavages in iraqi society that have been based on tribal and sectarian fights centuries old?

The picture is still not very pretty. Violence on a terrible scale is common in iraq. To suggest that everything is better now that some of the sunni have been integrated into the army and police is not credible. However everything requires first steps and this is an important one. If the sunni are able to successfully integrate themselves into the security forces and al maliki refrains from a power consolidation move against them then Iraq will be in a far better position than it was a couple of months ago.

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Obama Gonna Do What Obama Gonna Do.

There is a lot of discussion about what Obama is going to do with regards to appointments and with his agenda and whether he is going to be governing from the center or the left or any number of other things. While this speculation is fun and amusing the issue is whether or not any one has any influence over what Obama is planning to do with regards to these topics. I really dont think it matters what pundits or bloggers or reporters or the press says about these things, it wont have any impact whatsoever on what obama plans to do.

If we look back on the primaries and on the election is there an instance where what the press or the blogosphere was saying forced Obama to materially change his plans regarding policy, strategy or tactics. One thing people admire about Obama is his ability to game plan and then stick to that plan. The 50 state strategy and the relentless focus on ground level organizing are just a couple of examples of important long term strategies implemented by Obama.

What then will influence the Obama administration? can they be moved at all towards one policy or another? Obama has committed himself to limiting lobbyist access and has no real affinity for the press and he does not care about what the blogosphere is doing. It will be interesting to see if phone calls the the white house switchboard have the same impact that calls to a senator do.

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Religious Freedom

Religious freedom is precious thing. In that spirit i am glad to see the U.N. promoting it. The country leading the way though seems like an unfortunate choice.

Saudi Arabia, which deploys a special police force to ensure that a narrow sect of Islam predominates in the kingdom, is sponsoring a discussion at the United Nations on religious tolerance starting Wednesday.

Hmm. Good lead if somewhat painful to read. For some context,

“It’s like apartheid South Africa having a conference at the U.N. on racial harmony,” said Ali al-Ahmed, a Shiite Muslim dissident from Saudi Arabia based in Washington.

The different religions in this country who demand that their views be the only views in this country should think what it is like to be forbidden their religious views. I am looking at you LDS. Imagine trying to practice your faith in the kingdom.

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Faith in Politics

I question the value of employing faith based social outreach on tax payers dollars. It strikes me that the ability to be even handed in the dispensention of funding for religious orgs is going to be very complicated. I am very skeptical that non-christian groups are going to be reciving the same rate of funding as the christian groups.

Barack Obama is a very religious man. He is very supportive of faith based groups and its not particularly surprising considering his work as a community organizer. He is on record as supporting these groups only so long as they do not proselytize or try to recruit followers with the money given to them by the government. what are the chances that this holds true in practice? not very high i would think. Sure a church group can deliver food to the homeless and provide other much needed social services but there will always be a religious affiliation there. Can you really take the religion out of churches activities?

The outreach also provides a problem of oversight not found in secular relief or social organizations. There needs to be an added level of oversight to assure that the money is not going to fund the church's religious activities. That creates added bureaucracy and seems like a rather unnecessary hassle when we could just avoid dealing in faith based groups.

there are going to be situations where it appears that the only people willing to step in is a church. this is illusory though because as long as the incentive is provided a different group will spring up to fill the void. These groups that work with social ills are not doing this for profit but they need to be financially viable directing aid to other groups could most likely solve an situation where it appears a church is the only answer.

When the government gets into religion everything gets messy and complicated. This is a country where religion is supposed to be absent from government and faith based orgs receiving federal funding just does not seem to work with that.

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Office of Legal Counsel

The office of Legal Counsel (OLC) is one of the many appointments that President Obama will have to make for his administration. This appointment may not be as high profile as a treasury secretary of secretary of defense but the appointed person plays a critical role in the executive branch, giving opinions of the legality of something. The numerous and infamous memo's suborning torture and infinite detention of "enemy combatants" were products of OLC. The person Obama appoints will have the chore of going through these legal memo's and bringing them into compliance with real law instead of the imaginary law that President Bush subscribed to.

The Anonymous Liberal explains what can happen when the person in charge of keeping it legal is unprepared and unqualified.

After 9/11, John Yoo used his perch at the OLC to authorize a number of illegal activities--from torture to warrantless surveillance--that are not only deeply troubling but have badly damaged America's image in the world. Yoo was allowed to do most of this because the head of the OLC at the time, Jay Bybee, was not familiar with the relevant executive power issues and therefore allowed Yoo to run amok.

When Jack Goldsmith took over the OLC in 2003, he discovered--to his horror--that a multitude of Bush administration programs rested on entirely indefensible legal opinions drafted by the OLC during his predecessor's tenure. He was forced to walk most of them back, a move that caused a major internal dispute within the Bush administration and nearly resulted in the total implosion of the administration just prior to the 2004 election.

Whoever President Obama selects to head the OLC will have a critically important job. Virtually every opinion the OLC has issued during the post 9/11 era--even those written after Yoo's departure--will need to be reviewed and, in all likelihood, rewritten. Moreover, many of the terrorism-related laws that have been passed in the last few years--relating to surveillance, detention, torture, etc.--are filled with ambiguities and language that will require careful interpretation. Many new legal opinions, opinions that will be of enormous consequence, will need to be drafted.

There is a lot at stake. Just as Obama has put together a team to review 200 Bush administration actions and executive orders that could be swiftly undone to reverse the president on climate change, stem cell research, reproductive rights and other issues there is going to be a lot of people working on fixing the legal system.

To fix these issue will take some time. Rewriting and Re-researching all the legal memo's that have come out of the OLC under Bush will take an army of lawyers and researchers. The person selected to oversee the office will need to be ready to go from day 1. AL, Glenn Greenwald and Orin Kerr all have one person in mind, Georgetown Law Professor Marty Lederman.

Professor Lederman is exactly the sort of person I would want in charge of this important task. First, he's deeply familiar with all of the relevant executive power issues, having written about them extensively over the last few years. He is also intimately familiar with the workings of the OLC, having worked there from 1994-2002. And most importantly, I think Lederman has a good sense of what the OLC's role should be (i.e., not merely rubber-stamping whatever the president wants to do).

Seems to make sense. Experienced, apparently competent and qualified. Those should be positives.

I must believe that Obama will not be trying to commit activities he knows to illegal. There is a world of difference between getting an opinion on what is an is not legal and deciding to do something and justifying it after the fact. With Bush gone we might return to the former.

something to keep in mind

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The Fight for Accountability

Last night in the midst of the celebration Meteor Blades posted a diary that touched on an essential subject. Accountability of those who have placed us in this horrible mess. As President Obama takes office it is a lingering question whether or not he will follow through on promises to close guantanamo and to hold the people who screwed everything up accountable. Will Obama do as Ford did and throw accountability under the bus or will he affirm in no uncertain terms that no one is above the law? If it comes down to holding Bush Administration people responsible versus passing health care of major infrastructure reform we know that Bush and Co is going to get a pass.

A quote from Meteor Blades outlining perfectly the point of view and worry over holding those Bush Admin people responsible.

Barack Obama's promises of a broad bipartisan focus on solving our country's problems may prove as wise as the similar message of the Civil War president whose words echoed in the Grant Park speech. But that healing cannot occur, not wholly, unless the crimes that have brought our nation to such a ruinous condition - morally, economically and politically - are investigated thoroughly and a proper penalty imposed. Most importantly, the bent machinery that allowed, nay encouraged, those crimes must be rebuilt with safeguards so that they never occur again. That's not vengeance. It's justice. And true healing and progress cannot come about without it.

You can put me down in the column that needs to see some heads on this one. I truly believe that it is essential that we augment the the laws pertaining to governing our nation with the proof of punishment. We must demonstrate credibility on this issue or else the precedent set is one of excused criminality. What stops a future power abuser and criminal if they know that after they finish raping the country that they will be forgiven in the "best interests of the country to move on"?

Nothing epitomizes this more than the need to hold some people responsible for Guantanamo Bay Prison and the abuses that occur there. The story of that place will be a black mark on America's record akin to the internment of the Japanese during WWII. This is not to say that all the people there are innocent. However there are plenty of people who are, some even acknowledged by the government itself. Gitmo stands as a testament to abuses of human rights and due process. For our country to claim any moral authority we need to do more than simply elect an African American we need to clean up the mess.

Here is Obama on the topic of holding Bushies responsible,

Q: I mentioned the report in my question, and said "I know you've talked about reconciliation and moving on, but there's also the issue of justice, and a lot of people -- certainly around the world and certainly within this country -- feel that crimes were possibly committed" regarding torture, rendition, and illegal wiretapping. I wanted to know how whether his Justice Department "would aggressively go after and investigate whether crimes have been committed."

A: What I would want to do is to have my Justice Department and my Attorney General immediately review the information that's already there and to find out are there inquiries that need to be pursued. I can't prejudge that because we don't have access to all the material right now. I think that you are right, if crimes have been committed, they should be investigated. You're also right that I would not want my first term consumed by what was perceived on the part of Republicans as a partisan witch hunt because I think we've got too many problems we've got to solve.

So this is an area where I would want to exercise judgment -- I would want to find out directly from my Attorney General -- having pursued, having looked at what's out there right now -- are there possibilities of genuine crimes as opposed to really bad policies. And I think it's important-- one of the things we've got to figure out in our political culture generally is distinguishing between really dumb policies and policies that rise to the level of criminal activity. You know, I often get questions about impeachment at town hall meetings and I've said that is not something I think would be fruitful to pursue because I think that impeachment is something that should be reserved for exceptional circumstances. Now, if I found out that there were high officials who knowingly, consciously broke existing laws, engaged in cover ups of those crimes with knowledge forefront, then I think a basic principle of our Constitution is nobody above the law -- and I think that's roughly how I would look at it.

The answer is a mixed bag. There are some good things like supporting the concept that nobody is above the law. There are also some iffy parts like making the distinction between bad policy and breaking the law. That seems like a very broad net that will let unethical activities off the hook. For instance would Palin's pressuring of Monegan satisfy the Obama standard? I doubt it. A great deal is of the worst excesses and abuses are going to fall under bad policy as opposed to criminal malfeasance. However, people who screwed up their job, and by extension the country, so completely should not be let off the hook. The people need to be identified at the very least so that they may be subjected to a minimum of public shaming.

You can tell from his acceptance speech that Obama is going to be highly focused on building a true bi partisan administration. He is genuinely concerned about undermining this by going after bushies. I can just see where this is going to lead. Obama is a pragmatic man and when it comes down to passing the big legislation versus holding some people criminally liable, legislation wins. I think you can certainly balance the two but i dont know if Obama is willing to take that risk.

I dont want to dampen the excitement over an Obama election. It truly is a great step forward for our country; but like Obama said, his election is not the change but merely the first step on a long road to change. We may have won this election but the next 2-4 years will be very important in determining whether we can create a long lasting progressive government or whether we let the gop back in the door. This first step is to cleanse the blight of the last eight years. Hold the those people who decimated the government responsible otherwise we let a malignant cyst fester. A part of the Obama election must be read as a mandate to hold people accountable. So lets hold both Bush, for his past abuses, and Obama, in his future activities, accountable because no one is above the law.

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Prediction Post

Because all the cool kids are doing it.

* 58 Democratic Senate seats
* 40 Republican Senate seats
* 263 Democratic House seats
* 172 Republican House seats
* 353 Obama Electoral Votes
* 185 McCain Electoral Votes
* 52.1 Obama Popular Vote Percentage
* 47.5 McCain Popular Vote Percentage

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It was all in good fun.

McCain appeared on SNL last night and the skit was pretty funny. Tina Fey reprized her role as Palin and Palin was pretty well trashed in the skit. McCain came off pretty well. Cindy even made an appearance. I think this was clearly the first step in rehabbing his image should he lose, or even win, on tuesday. McCain is hoping that he can simply shrug off the tactics and tenor of his campaign after the election. He will give a shoulder shrug and a simple, "thats politics" and maybe throw in a bit about regretting that "some things got out of hand" but that was all Palin and Schmidts fault. McCain then will probably try and make a big gesture to President Obama, on climate change.

Climate change is the one area that Obama continuously credits mccain with good work. McCain will probably use this as a platform to rehab his maverick image. the media of course will be more than happy to assist in this. They never really believed that mccain was anything more than an honorable man trapped by the evil obama into making dastardly attacks on him...or something. Meanwhile liberals everywhere will be banging their heads against the wall.

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