Α Δ Φ vs. Westboro Baptist Church
Α Δ Φ: 1
Westboro Baptist Church: 0
Category: Civil Rights
Do Not Reward the Incompetent
While I’ve heard complaints about the people who campaigned against Proposition 8 in California, I’ve not followed it closely, but the following is unbelievable. Anyone who had anything to do with the “No on 8” campaign should never be hired as a political consultant ever again:
At the forum, Kors said turning the campaign over to the consultants was “a huge mistake.”
Smith also acknowledged that the campaign should have used then-presidential candidate Barack Obama’s stated opposition to Prop 8. Instead, little use was made of Obama’s opposition in a letter last June to the Alice B. Toklas LGBT Democratic Club, and right before Election Day the Yes on 8 campaign sent out a mailer featuring Obama’s image and quotes that he is opposed to same-sex marriage.
“That was a close call,” Smith said. “Maybe we should have.”
Maybe you should have? Maybe you should have?
This is so phenomenally stupid it beggars the imagination.
Smith said that people outside the Bay Area wouldn’t know what the Alice Club was, but club Co-Chair Susan Christian spoke up and said that in fact, Obama’s letter to the club been widely reported, including in the New York Times.
Win or lose at the California Supreme Court, and the indications are that it will be a lose, this will be on the ballot as an initiative petition in 2010, and job 1 is to ensure that the folks who ran “No on 8” don’t get into positions of authority on this.
Al-Marri Detention Suit Dismissed by SCOTUS
So the issue of indefinite detention is unresolved, though according to ScotusBlog, we have half a loaf:
The Fourth Circuit Court, in a splintered decision, upheld that authority under the 2001 Resolution, but did not rule on the government’s alternative claim that the President’s constitutional power as Commander-in-Chief supported the action. While the Supreme Court’s order Friday does not indicate how the Justices would have ruled had they gone ahead with their review, the order “vacated” the Circuit Court ruling, meaning that it no longer is a binding precedent on the issues it decided.
I’d rather see a ruling declaring the detention illegal, but the dismissal a bit better than the status quo.
Zimbabwe Update
I guess that the lede is that Morgan Tsvangirai has been injured in car accident, though at this time, his injuries appear “non critical”, though it has also been reported that his wife was killed.
The rest of developments have judicial with human rights campaigner Jestina Mukoko having been freed, but reporter Brian Hungwe is still in detention, albeit at a hospital.
We also had a judge ordering that MDC activist, and Deputy Minister of Agriculture designate, Roy Bennett be released on bail, though he is still in detention pending a review by the Supreme court, and the judge who issued the bail order has been arrested.
Needless to say, things in Zimbabwe remain unsettled.
Banning Voter Caging
Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) has proposed a bill making it illegal, which is nice, but I don’t see the word “felony”.
In reviewing the full text of the bill it appears to be just a fine, though I guess a perjury prosecution could be possible too, if you can show truly malicious intent.
Yes
Glenn Greenwald asks, “Is Obama embracing the lawless, omnipotent executive?” by endorsing a position that the President, and the President alone has the authority to determine what classified documents it must release under court order.
This has been another episode of simple answers to simple questions. (apologies to Atrios)
It’s disgraceful, but not unsurprising. After all, how often do you see an executive voluntary give up authority that a predecessor successfully asserted?
Chavez’s Finally Gets Unlimited Terms
The referrenda results are not surprising.
The depressing thing here is not that Chavez is a slightly loopy man with no respect for Democracy.
The depressing thing is that even with that, he is still miles ahead of what were the ruling classes in Venezuela.
Zimbabwe: Tsvangerai Sworn in as PM
So, Tsvangirai is finally PM, though, rather tellingly, his acceptance speech was not carried on state radio or TV.
Note that arrests by ZANU-PF aligned elements in the state security apparatus, and there is apparently an arrest order out for deputy agriculture minister nominee, Roy Bennett, and human rights lawyers have been placed arrested.
Meanwhile, treason charges against Tendai Biti have been dropped, which is a good thing, as the nominee for Finance Minister.
Truth be told, considering the state of finance in Zimbabwe, I might have gone with jail time.
On a less snarky note, Biti might very well be the person bets positioned to counterbalance Robert Mugabe, because he is the one who determines when, and how, civil servants get paid, and with Zimbabwe moving to abandon its own currency, the decision of who gets paid in $Z, and who gets paid in USD or Euro or Rand would be a very good way to create real disincentives for those agencies most willing to do Mugabe’s dirty work.
There are some new structures in place intended to create a more transparent and less political state security apparatus, but I am not optimistic that this will make much of a difference.
Zimbabwe Government Formed, Etc.
It appears that their parliament has passed a bill allowing for a unity government, as a result of the strong-arming of former South African president Mbeki and the South African Development Community (SADC).
As I’ve said before, I think that this will work as well as Nkomo’s incorporation into Zimbabwe government, as in not at all.
Meanwhile the EU will maintain sanctions against ZANU-PF officials, even though the
African Union has asked them to be lifted.
This is a good thing. The upper levels of ZANU-PF are nothing more than thieves, and denying them easy access to banks to hide their ill-gotten gains is a good start, particularly when Zimbabwe was just forced to issue new dollars worth a trillion times more than the old ones, because of hyper-inflation.
Bolivians Plebiscite Ratifies New Constitution
Evo Moralez got the new constitution he wanted for Bolivia:
Bullet points
- President can now hold 2 consecutive terms.
- State ownership of water resources. (There was a water privatizaiton fiasco, where people were charge something like 1/3 of the monthly salary for water)
- Reserved spaces in the legislature and bureaucracy for the Indian population.
- Guarantees reproductive rights.
- Removes Catholicism as the state religion.
- Limits on the size of new landholdings.
- Expands the states control of the economy.
- Tightens state control of energy resources.
Generally, it looks like a good thing, though I am always dubious of mandates of ethnically allocated slots in either government or bureaucracy.
Props to My Cousin
Who I’ve never met, Dianne Feinstein*, it appears that even though Obama has issued an executive order banning torture, she is proceeding with legislation to make it the law of the land:
Senator Dianne Feinstein, Democrat of California and chairwoman of the committee, said that despite the executive orders she still planned to press for legislation mandating a single standard for military and C.I.A. interrogators. Such a law would be harder to reverse than Mr. Obama’s executive order, which he could alter or cancel at any time by issuing a new order.
Cool.
*Full disclosure, my great grandfather, Harry Goldman, and her grandfather, Sam Goldman were brothers.
Good News from the White House
New executive orders from President Barack Obama, directing that the Guantánamo Bay dentition facility and the CIA’s Gulag Archipelago of secret prisons be closed within a year.
He also ordered, “ll federal agencies and departments on Tuesday to stop any pending regulations until they can be reviewed by incoming staff.”
It’s nice to have people in the White House who aren’t, you know, irredeemably evil.
But I still want war crimes prosecutions.
Video: NSA Whistleblower Interview
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
Spying on the Press and Media Outlets, Huh?
An NSA whistleblower was on Olbermann about this, and said that journalists were under constant surveillance.
As I said in May 2008, they likely wiretapped Christiane Amanpour in 2004, and her husband, James Rubin, was senior adviser for national security affairs for the John Kerry campaign.
This is not just spying on the press. This is spying on the political opposition by proxy.
Israel’s Supreme Court Revokes Party Ban
No surprise. It’s happened before, and now Supreme Court has again revoked a ban of Arab parties by a Knesset committee.
Everyone who voted to the ban the party knew that this would happen, but they also saw political benefit in doing so, because some of the more prominent Israeli Arab politicians are viewed as assholes.
My previous post on this was called, “Stupid and Damaging Electioneering,” and I stand by that.
This is kind of the polar opposite of Dukkakis and the pledge of allegiance in the 1988 campaign. He vetoed the bill, even though he knew it would be unpopular, because he knew that it was unconstitutional.
Israeli politics sucks.
Zimbabwe Update
It’s been about 3 weeks since I posted on Zimbabwe, and the news remains remarkably depressing.
While there were indications of some level of dissention within the ZANU-PF at their party congress, Mugabe is still casting all this as an attempt by white farmers to keep their farms, and that was eaten up by the party faithful.
The problem with the land distribution was not that land was seized, but that it was not redistributed, it was simply given to party cronies who have little inclination or interest in farming.
Of course, Mugabe and ZANU-PF are not really to well attached to reality anyway, as evidenced by his claim that he sent invitations for Tsvangerai and Mutambara to further meetings about a unity government, when he hadn’t.
Even if he were to have sent invitations, the meetings would clearly not be in good faith, with mass arrest of opposition and human rights activists, along with his refusal to obey judicial orders to release and/or present them to the court. (also here)
Needless to say, the fact that South Africa is once again covering for this, saying that, this should not delay the formation of a unity government, is depressing.
Both the United States and Britain are now publicly saying that Mugabe cannot be trusted as an honest broker in any unity government.
Finally, Mugabe is saying that he will unilaterally form a new government in February.
On the brighter side, it looks like there is a COPE, the ANC splinter party, calling for sanctions against Zimbabwe.
Given that South Africa supplies much of the power, fuel, and food that Zimbabwe needs, there is a fairly good chance that this stick would have real meaning.
What’s more, Desmond Tutu is suggesting that there needs to be a credible threat of military force against Zimbabwe in order for their to be real change.
When a Nobel Peace Prize winner calls for the Marines…..
The humanitarian nightmare is also continuing unabated, with Cholera still running rampant, and increasing problems with severe malnutrition, particularly among children.
Cheney Says That Congressional Leadership Were Co-Conspirators
Cheney is saying that Congressional leaders were fully briefed and approved of the warrantless wiretapping at various times from 2001 through 2004, which would mean that Pelosi, and HHS Secretary nominee Tom Daschle are co-conspirators.
My guess would be that if Cheney is telling the truth, and that is a big if, then they are probably in on torture too.
Zimbabwe Update
On the theory that if it bleeds, it leads, the lead story here is the shooting of the commander of the Zimbabwe Air Force known to be a close ally of Mugabe, in an apparent assassination attempt.
I would be unsurprised if there were more of this.
I am also unsurprised at the African Union’s decision to ratchet up measures against Mugabe and the ZANU-PF. There is a lot of, “There but for the grace of God, go I,” in what has been going on there.
In any case, some things stay the same, like Thabo Mbeki still working for power sharing, and never once laying an ounce of blame on either Mugabe or the ZANU-PF.
I have no clue why anyone in their right mind would treat him with anything but contempt.
Mugabe is attempting to put forward his false “unity government”, by publishing a the government law (it’s a parliamentary thing), though the MDC majority in parliament has no intention of ever taking taking it to the floor.
The same can be said for Mugabe’s “asking” Tsvangirai to allow himself to be sworn in as PM.
Under the current power sharing arrangement, both mean nothing.
In any case Mugabe is now suggesting that there be new elections, which would be even heavier on the violence than the prior ones no doubt.
Anyone who thinks that he will negotiate in good faith, need only look at the speech that he gave to the ZANU-PF annual conference, where he said, “Zimbabwe is mine.”
The only way we will see reform from him is if the sanctions against him are severe enough to coerce his agreement.
One sign that Mugabe is looking to step up the violence is that he is now claiming that the opposition is sponsoring a guerrilla war against him.
The idea of the state security forces of Zimbabwe being unleashed with the fig leaf of a counter-insurgency campaign is appalling.
It is thus no surprise that the MDC is threatening to leave unity talks, which I think is an attempt to get Mugabe to stop disappearing opposition leaders.
Finally, it appears that the cholera epidemic is getting worse.
Muntader al-Zaidi Update
Well, we now have an Iraqi judge stating that he was beaten, and both Sunni and Shia clerics are calling for his release.
It appears that there is increasing support at all levels of Iraqi society for his “Shoe d’Etat”, and while I still don’t rate his survival chance high, but I think that his chances of getting out of this breathing are getting better.
Tin Foil Hat Time
We have reports now that the Army War College is doing studies on the use of the military against US citizens during times of unrest.
A new report by the U.S. Army War College talks about the possibility of Pentagon resources and troops being used should the economic crisis lead to civil unrest, such as protests against businesses and government or runs on beleaguered banks.
“Widespread civil violence inside the United States would force the defense establishment to reorient priorities in extremis to defend basic domestic order and human security,” said the War College report.
The study says economic collapse, terrorism and loss of legal order are among possible domestic shocks that might require military action within the U.S.
Not surprising as the Posse Comitatus act has been whittled down to nothing over the past few years.