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15 Nov 08

Knowing when to walk away

Bush understands what happened in 1993 when his father left an almost-finished North American Free Trade Agreement in the lap of President Bill Clinton's incoming administration. He knows that business interests subsequently pressured Clinton into joining with Republicans to pass the pact over his own party's opposition. His Rove-trained mind gets what the Nation's John Nichols reported: that the payout came with a 1994 election whose NAFTA taint delivered "a dramatic drop in turnout among members of union households," decreased "Democratic support in traditional areas of strength" - and thus birthed the Republican Congress.

Bush wants to replicate this Three Card Monte - and the Colombia trade pact is his ace in the hole.

The deal would reward a right-wing Colombian regime under investigation for links to paramilitary gangs, drug cartels and anti-union brutality. Like NAFTA, it includes few labor protections, meaning it will enrich Bush's corporate donors by forcing Americans into a wage-cutting competition with low-paid foreign workers. And, most important to Bush's legacy, the pact could bust Democrats before they ever have a chance to unify.

NAFTA proved that trade is the most divisive issue inside the Democratic Party. On one side is the party's Wall Street wing that supports free trade. On the other side is its progressive wing that wants our trade policies reformed. Lately, the latter has increased its clout. As globalization became a major campaign theme in the last two elections, the watchdog group Public Citizen reports that free trade critics replaced free trade proponents in 69 House and Senate races. These new populists, along with Democrats' more senior progressive incumbents, comprise a powerful new voting bloc promising to reject deals like the Colombia agreement and protect labor and human rights.

Therefore, if Bush successfully uses the economic emergency to hustle a faction of Wall Street Democrats into supporting the deal, he will have potentially engineered a 1994 redux: Democratic infigh

www.sfgate.com/...article.cgi - Preview

politics Bush Obama NAFTA Columbia trade deal bailout

02 Jun 08

Waterboarding is legal, White House says - Los Angeles Times

  • WASHINGTON --
    The White House said Wednesday that the widely condemned interrogation technique known as waterboarding is legal and that President Bush could authorize the CIA to resume using the simulated-drowning method under extraordinary circumstances.
  • WASHINGTON --
    The White House said Wednesday that the widely condemned interrogation technique known as waterboarding is legal and that President Bush could authorize the CIA to resume using the simulated-drowning method under extraordinary circumstances.
  • 8 more annotations...
28 Jun 07

The Blog | Byron Williams: The Slippery Slide Away From Habeas Corpus | The Huffington Post

  • All Americans regardless of political philosophy or party affiliation ought to take note when the attorney general tells the Senate Judiciary Committee that the U.S. Constitution does not guarantee habeas corpus.



    In justifying the law signed by the president last October that stripped federal courts of their authority to hear habeas corpus suits by noncitizens labeled "enemy combatants," U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales testified last week: "The Constitution doesn't say every individual in the United States or every citizen is hereby granted or assured the right of habeas."



    <!-- begin ad tag (ptile=2) 300x250--><!-- End ad tag -->
    Gonzales' contention, which undoubtedly is the Bush administration's most far-reaching in its battle against the war on terror, threatens to take the country down a slippery slope that undermines the very basis of the republic.

    The writ of habeas corpus requires that a person detained by the authorities be brought before a court of law so that the legality of the detention may be examined.

30 Jan 07

The Blog | Larry Beinhart: What Habeas Corpus Means to You | The Huffington Post

  • This is a very good explanation of Habeas Corpus, what it means and what happens when we lose that right.
     - helaine on 2007-01-30


  • Under Habeas Corpus, you have the right to say, I want to be brought into the court to determine if I am the right person charged, if there's an actual law prohibiting what I'm charged with, if the people who are holding me have the jurisdiction to do so, and I want that publicly known and I want the right to dispute all of that and the right to be tried too.





    Without Habeas Corpus you can be swept up off the street and never heard from again. Period. Nobody has to know. Nobody - including yourself - has to know why. Nobody gets to determine if there is a law against what you're charged with. You have no rights at all.





    In America, the Constitution forbids taking habeas corpus away from you (except "in case of rebellion or invasion the public safety shall require it.") It was written that way because the right of habeas corpus was a basic right even under the King of England. It was the most basic check on a king's tyranny. It was assumed.

26 Jan 07

9/11 Is Why He's The Worst President Ever | The Huffington Post

  • In Sunday's Washington Post, Douglas Brinkley opened the official public portion of the debate amongst historians as to whether President Bush has been the worst president in American history. Meanwhile, the debate on this topic has been on-going in the b - helaine on 2007-01-26
23 Mar 05

Bush Role in Schiavo Case Bothers Right

  • "It contradicts a lot of what those behind it say they believe: the sanctity of the family, the sacred bond between husband and wife, the ability of all of us to make private decisions without the hand of government intervening, deference to states and localities as opposed to the centralized government," said Lichtman.
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