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Habeas Corpus
I'm at a loss to say anything clever about this, but the American congress is in the middle of debating whether to get rid of habeas corpus.
If you are an American citizen, you might want to call your Senator today. Be polite and firm. "I'm kind of partial to the rule of law. Would it be too much trouble to refrain from locking people up indefinitely with no access to a court?"
Posted by benrosen at September 18, 2006 12:23 PM | Up to blogThanks for the head's up, Ben.
Posted by: Jason Erik Lundberg at September 18, 2006 01:29 PMI've been having difficulty finding out anything about this other than the Democracy In Action alert. Have Senators Specter and Levin actually proposed an amendment? I certainly would support such an amendment, depending in part on its language of course, but it isn't clear to me that it exists. The only things I've seen about it are in the DIA alert and in posts that link only to that alert. Well, and the Institute for Public Accuracy seems to think that the question of habeus corpus in the Warner-Graham-McCain bill is complicated. Which is likely to be true.
Can you believe we're even having this conversation? I mean, the whole conversation about whether or not we should have to charge people with crimes if we're going to imprison them for years and years? I thought we had reached consensus on that one.
Thanks,
-V.
You would think.
Posted by: Benjamin Rosenbaum at September 20, 2006 02:58 PMThe Warner bill may be found here. This seems to be S. 3901.
The Frist version is here. Seems to be S. 3861.
I find this whole thing appalling.
Curiously, V, I haven't been able to escape it - NPR talks about these bills all the time...
Posted by: Matt Hulan at September 20, 2006 04:33 PMMatt--I have the info on the bills, it's the amendment I can't seem to locate. There's nothing on Senator Specter's web site, nor Senator Levin's. I don't know if there is such an amendment. Part of my problem is that I don't really trust Senator Levin (although on the whole I like the guy), and I really don't trust Senator Specter. So I am reluctant to call my Senator and tell him to vote for an amendment they are introducing without actually seeing the text of it - or at least a summary they put their names to.
Thanks,
-V.
Huh.
There seems to be no Specter-Levin amendment - the blogosphere is going crazy about having your senator vote for it when it's introduced, but there is no real info on what, specifically, it is, or when (if ever) it will get introduced.
This could be one of the Administration's Clever Ploys... "Let's get them to encourage their senators to vote for a bill that will 'fix' the problem." Then the senators are free to vote for the President's bill, thinking "Oh, I'll just vote for Specter-Levin." But of course, there IS no Specter-Levin.
Brain: Are You Pondering What I'm Pondering?
Pinky: Yes, Brain. But how are we going to convince the military to stage a bloodless coup at this hour?
peace
Matt
Too late...
Posted by: Matt at September 29, 2006 11:51 AM