Month: January 2008

Revenge Of The Christianists

Grrr:

Governor Huckabee’s win demonstrates that grass-roots conservatives have flatly rejected the candidacy of Mitt Romney. Mitt can stay in as long as he wishes to fund his own campaign, but he’s essentially done. McCain is going to win New Hampshire, and either McCain or Huckabee is going to win South Carolina. So, if you been waiting to buy ol’ Hugh’s book (but didn’t want to pay full price for it), just wait a week or so, and it will be on sale at your local Sam’s Club in the dollar bin.

Padilla Sues Yoo

Padillagoggles

Just filed:

Defendant John Yoo, along with other senior officials, deliberately removed Mr. Padilla from due process protections traditionally available to U.S. citizens detained by their government and barred all access to the outside world, including access to counsel.  On information and belief, Defendant Yoo and other senior officials then personally formulated and/or approved and/or failed to act upon actual or constructive knowledge of, a systematic program of illegal detention and interrogation, which was specifically designed to inflict, and did inflict, severe physical and mental pain and suffering on Mr. Padilla for the purpose of extracting information from him and/or punishing him without due process of law, and which proximately caused the harms to Mr. Padilla alleged herein…   

Defendant Yoo personally provided numerous legal memoranda that purported to provide to senior government officials a legal basis to implement an extreme and unprecedented interrogation and detention program – even though such tactics are unprecedented in U.S. history and clearly contrary to the U.S. Constitution and the law of war.

# Mr. Padilla suffered and continues to suffer severe mental and physical harm as a result of the forty-four months of military detention and interrogation that he endured, detention and interrogation for which Defendant Yoo personally purported to provide a legal blank check.

# Ms. Lebron was also injured by the conduct of the Defendant, which caused her to be deprived of the virtually all contact with her son, Mr. Padilla, for the duration of his illegal detention and interrogation, in violation of her constitutional rights to familial association and communication.

# Plaintiffs Padilla and Lebron assert this complaint against Defendant John Yoo in his individual capacity.

Rhetoric Still Matters

Huckabeestephaniekuykendalgetty

One aspect of this race that has not been given enough notice so far: Obama and Huckabee and Edwards are easily the best public speakers in this race. They won last night in part because of their ability to connect with people in large settings. You hear in Obama and Huckabee the cadences of the churches they come from –  "the holy places where the races meet" – but you also hear men who have honed their rhetorical skills over the years, and actually connect their own thoughts into words. Contrast these skills with Romney and Clinton, who are competent but programmed like a salesman and a focus group respectively.

In the television and internet age, old-style rhetoric is sometimes regarded as an anachronism. It isn’t. Huckabee’s brilliance in the debates gave him this opportunity. Obama’s public speeches have been the best in a candidate since Reagan and Kennedy. As someone who was trained in and loves debate, it’s good to see this old skill gain new salience. Lincoln would be proud.

(Photo: Stephanie Kuykendal/Getty.)

Obvious In Retrospect?

Josh Patashnik:

Politics is not rocket science. You have one party led by a deeply unpopular, unapologetic right-wing ideologue whom its presidential candidates nevertheless decided to embrace. You have another party that has spent most of the past quarter-century undergoing the painful but necessary process of taming its own ideological excesses and tacking to the center. As a result, it now boasts appealing, mainstream candidates with pragmatic policy proposals for addressing real problems. What, exactly, did people think was going to happen?