Month: May 2006

Clapham Common, London, 11am.

"That’s how this group of Bush followers thinks America is supposed to work. If you are a U.S. citizen, the President can unilaterally order you abducted and imprisoned; does not have to charge you with any crime; can block you from speaking with anyone, including a lawyer; can keep you incarcerated indefinitely (meaning forever); and can deny you the right to any judicial review of your imprisonment or any mechanism for challenging the accuracy of the accusations. And oh – while it would be nice if we could preserve all of that abstract lawyer nonsense about the right to a jury trial and all that, we’re really scared that Al Qaeda is going to kill us, so we can’t," – Glenn Greenwald, on his blog yesterday.

Ypsilanti, Michigan, dawn.

Edinburgh, Scotland, 10.30 am.

Tel Aviv, Israel, 11.30 am.

My obsession with Pat Robertson’s power-glutes has now reached CNN’s Anderson Cooper and Drudge. It continues over at Slate.

Retired navy general counsel, Alberto Mora, explains what is still at stake in the Bush administration’s abandonment of core American values:

Whatever the ultimate historical judgment, it is established fact that documents justifying and authorizing the abusive treatment of detainees during interrogation were approved and distributed. These authorizations rested on three beliefs: that no law prohibited the application of cruelty; that no law should be adopted that would do so; and that our government could choose to apply the cruelty — or not — as a matter of policy depending on the dictates of perceived military necessity.

The fact that we adopted this policy demonstrates that this war has tested more than our nation’s ability to defend itself. It has tested our response to our fears and the measure of our courage. It has tested our commitment to our most fundamental values and our constitutional principles.

In this war, we have come to a crossroads — much as we did in the events that led to Korematsu : Will we continue to regard the protection and promotion of human dignity as the essence of our national character and purpose, or will we bargain away human and national dignity in return for an additional possible measure of physical security?

As Mora notes, this issue has not gone away.

The National Catholic Reporter reflects on its long and ultimately successful campaign to hold Legion of Christ founder, Father Marcial Maciel, responsible for a long history of sexual abuse. Others were responsible as well:

For all of the commendable achievements of Pope John Paul II, his blindness to this cancer within the church and his unwillingness until the last years of his long reign to understand the urgency of the problem will be seen as serious flaws of his tenure. His inaction sent signals that he both tolerated and encouraged the debilitating culture of deceit.

The case of Father Maciel, whose victims ranged from youngsters in his charge to young priests, is the most dramatic example of the late pope’s failure. Vatican officials today explain that John Paul did not have the information with which to judge the case. That’s the very point, however. One can only conclude he failed to listen to the victims and believed for far too long that the scandal was the malicious work of those who opposed the Legion because of its loyalty to him.

Almost all the theocons who defended Maciel maintain radio silence.

Canberra, Australia, sunset.

Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, 3.40 pm.