10:26pm EST

Nancy Pelosi just proposed an issue (not sure of the specific procedure, other than "under Rule 9") that the House vote on a statement (resolution?) that would assure parents that if they entrusted their child(ren) to the Page program, that nothing "like this" Rep Foley incident would ever happen again.

Republican response is to "refer" the issue to the Ethics Committee which would consider it after the elections.

Posted at September 29, 2006 7:27 PM in response to Pedogate: Republican Pedophile Sex Scandal Goes Higher

Do you think this might be the (or an) "October Surprise" that Rove has apparently assured supporters?

Posted at September 23, 2006 7:53 AM in response to John Bolton Could Be Given Pay Cut and Appointed Deputy Ambassador in Bid to Keep Him at UN

To download the actual text of our concern see the link in the comment below, at: http://balkin.blogspot.com/

Text of Current Bush-Senate Compromise Bill Friday, September 22, 2006 JB Here is the latest version of the Military Commission Bill, including all of the compromises agreed to by the Administration and Senators McCain, Graham, and Warner. The worst parts begin on p. 81, eliminating the writ of habeas corpus, denying anyone the right to invoke rights guaranteed by Geneva in judicial actions, prohibiting the use of any foreign sources in construing the meaning of the Geneva Conventions, proclaiming that the President is the authoritative source of the meaning of Geneva with respect to the War Crimes statute, amending the War Crimes statute with language that allows the President to continue to engage in torture-lite (after all, he is now the authoritative source of its meaning), and finally, making all these amendments retroactive to November 26th, 1997 (i.e., well before September 11th, 2001. I wonder what led to this particular change?)

This is a bill that all Americans can truly be ashamed of. And it has been given to us courtesy of our elected leaders, the party of Torture-lite.

Posted at September 22, 2006 8:57 PM in response to Discuss the Torture Deal

For a PDF of the GOP/WH pro-torture agreement see:

http://balkin.blogspot.com/2006/09/senators-snatch-defeat- from-jaws-of.html

It is a part of Marty Lederman's "Senators Snatch Defeat From Jaws of Victory: U.S. to be First Nation to Authorize Violations of Geneva"

Posted at September 22, 2006 8:30 PM in response to Delegating to the President on Torture

For a PDF of the GOP/WH pro-torture agreement see:

http://balkin.blogspot.com/2006/09/senators-snatch-defeat-from-jaws-of.html

It is a part of Marty Lederman's "Senators Snatch Defeat From Jaws of Victory: U.S. to be First Nation to Authorize Violations of Geneva"

Posted at September 22, 2006 8:29 PM in response to Delegating to the President on Torture

LMAO--cupcake?? sunshine?? delicious. What's next, "testosterone-challenged"? "PMS-benighted"? "Menopausal"?

Alas, too often the macho card is played, as if it were persuasive. (Haven't we had enough of it with Bush's swagger?)

Posted at September 22, 2006 5:11 PM in response to Discuss the Torture Deal

More to the point:

I am not equating torture victims' anguish with the dehumanizing effects on torturers. I am suggesting that a U.S. law "blessing" torture dehumanizes US.

The argument isn't about the "evildoers," or protecting us from them; it is about who we are as Americans and what we stand and proclaim to the world.

Yes, we apparently have different fundamental beliefs about what makes a torturer engage in torture. You, Valdron, seem to think it is a personality defect or at least a personality tendency that can be exploited. I believe that otherwise moral people will engage in heinous acts given a confluence of psychology and certain social conditions.

I'm sure you're familiar with the 1960 Stanley Milgram experiments, yes? Milgram concluded:

"With numbing regularity good people were seen to knuckle under to the demands of authority and perform actions that were callous and severe," he wrote. "Men who are in everyday life responsible and decent were seduced by the trappings of authority, by the control of their perceptions, and by the uncritical acceptance of the experiment's definition of the situation into performing harsh acts....

"This is perhaps the most fundamental lesson of our study: ordinary people, simply doing their jobs, without any particular hostility on their part, can become agents in a terrible destructive process."

Also check out: John Conroy's UNSPEAKABEL ACTS, ORDINARY PEOPLE: DYNAMICS OF TORTURE, (Knopf, 2000); Chris Mackey & Greg Miller's THE INTERROGATORS: INSIDE THE SECRET WAR AGAINST AL QAEDA, (Little Brown, 2004).

Posted at September 22, 2006 5:01 PM in response to Discuss the Torture Deal

Offensive? To what, delicate sensibilities that would rather contemplate the photos from Abu Ghraib? Guess we're in sharp disagreement.

Listen to Vladimir Bukovsky, a Soviet dissident who spent 12 years imprisoned and tortured:

". . .how can you force your officers and your young people in the CIA to commit acts that will scar them forever? For scarred they will be, take my word for it."

"Today, when the White House lawyers seem preoccupied with contriving a way to stem the flow of possible lawsuits from former detainees, I strongly recommend that they think about another flood of suits, from the men and women in your armed services or the CIA agents who have been or will be engaged in CID [cruel, inhumane, degrading treatment] practices. Our rich experience in Russia has shown that many will become alcoholics or drug addicts, violent criminals or, at the very least, despotic and abusive fathers and mothers."

Bukovsky wrote this Washington Post piece: Sunday 12/18/2005, p. B01. Josh has a link up for it in the TPM-Memo.

Posted at September 22, 2006 4:39 PM in response to Discuss the Torture Deal

To: Juliette Kayyem

Is the text of the "agreement" that you've read available on-line?

Please let us know how we can access it.
Thanks!

Posted at September 22, 2006 2:43 PM in response to Delegating to the President on Torture

What too many commentators on torture overlook is that the interrogation process is a relationship.

The suspect ostensibly has information that the interrogator attempts to elicit. The encounters between them may last hours and hours in a single session, and sessions may occur numerous times over a period of days, weeks or months. As with all relationships, all the parties to them are impacted by the encounters.

When the encounter does violence to the suspect, the interrogator/torturer perpetrating the violence is also affected by it. To the extent that they act in our name, we too share in the violence. Alas, we become not a nation of laws and principles, but one of power-corrupted imperialists who will justify all ends by all means.

Posted at September 22, 2006 12:35 PM in response to Discuss the Torture Deal