In the mystic haze of midsummer, a most unlikely Oberon stepped forth last week to fling a spray of fairy light across the murk, rousing the ill-enchanted sleepers with the hope that dawn had finally come again. But as the magic glow fades, the spell-struck victims will likely find they are still caught in a curse of perpetual night.
We speak of course of the U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down the ludicrous and lawless "military tribunals" concocted by President George W. Bush to serve as meat grinders for the captives in his War on Terror. Led by the sprightly 86-year-old Justice John Paul Stevens, a narrow court majority delivered a stinging rebuke to Bush's assumption of imperial powers over the past five years, clearly rejecting the fundamental principle underlying the Crawford Caligula's foul misrule: that the president's unbridled will is the law.
The ruling has been hailed as a "victory for democracy," the "light at the end of the tunnel," a "turning point" in the long struggle to reclaim the republic from the usurping junta of the Bush regime. But we have seen these lights before, and watched them fade. All the previous "turning points" -- scandals, atrocities, judicial rebuffs, investigations, convictions -- have only led to more depredations; every seeming defeat of unlawful power becomes instead a springboard for its further advancement. There is no reason to think it will be any different this time.
To be sure, Stevens and his allies fought a valiant rear-guard action on behalf of liberty. They could have restricted their response to the narrow technical points at issue in the case, but instead they took a broad scythe to the rank undergrowth of legal perversion spawned by the White House and its chief constitutional corrupter, David Addington, the ruthless vizier to Vice President Dick Cheney. As The New Yorker reports, all laws now pass through the hands of this unelected factotum, who feverishly screens them for any possible encroachments on presidential power -- then writes the "signing statements" that Bush appends to every major piece of legislation, declaring that he will follow the new law, or not, as it suits him. "I'm the decider," as Bush likes to say in his cretinous playground patois. But it is Addington and Cheney who have sown the noxious weeds of tyranny that Bush so happily grazes upon.
So there was rich irony in seeing their malevolent system chastised by Stevens, a conservative Republican whose 1975 appointment by President Gerald Ford was certainly handled by Ford's powerful chief of staff: an ambitious apparatchik named Dick Cheney. And the Stevens decision would indeed be a landmark ruling, a return to sanity -- if we were still in an era where the institutions of American government and society were actually functional, and officeholders felt bound by law. But if there is no political will in the American establishment to enforce the ruling, it will be nothing more than a pretty ornament for the republic's coffin.
And where does that will exist? Not in Congress, not in the media, not in the streets -- and certainly not in the confused, craven Democratic opposition. Yet the true nature of the regime's wide-ranging war on liberty has been glaringly obvious for years. We've been writing here about Bush's power grab since November 2001, when we noted that he had given himself the right to order the killing or incarceration of anyone on earth whom he arbitrarily deemed a terrorist -- or even a terrorist suspect. This was reported openly at the time, with approval from the gung-ho corporate media and the U.S. political establishment, with record-breaking poll numbers for Bush and with nary a peep from the Democrats. The first press reports of tortured captives quickly followed, again without controversy.
Indeed, for all its reputed obsession with secrecy, the Bush regime has been remarkably open about its usurpations. "Extrajudicial killing," torture, indefinite detention, mass surveillance, defiance of court rulings and Congress, employment of death squads, an unprovoked war of aggression -- all have been carried out openly, readily apparent to anyone with access to mainstream media sources. That the Supreme Court has only now challenged the essence of Bush's claim to authoritarian power is poignant testimony to how deep the rot of tyranny has spread.
Bush's reaction to the ruling is more evidence of the decay. After a vague, haughty promise to "look at the findings" -- rather than simply obey them, as the law requires -- Bush declared: "One thing I'm not going to do, though, is I'm not going to jeopardize the safety of the American people. People have got to understand that." Thus, in his mind, the circular reasoning that forms the core of his authoritarian philosophy remains intact: Any action that he arbitrarily declares necessary to ensure "the safety of the American people" cannot be restrained by laws or courts.
Already, the lickspittle, lock-step Congress is preparing to belch forth laws to retroactively legalize past Bush crimes and countenance future offenses. As legal scholar Mark Garber notes, this will likely satisfy at least one of the court's wavering moderates when the next test of Bush's tyranny comes around, sinking the razor-thin majority for liberty -- which will soon disappear in any case when the ancient Stevens shuffles off this mortal coil. His bold stroke for freedom was magic indeed, but it may prove, in the corrupted currents of this world, to be such stuff as dreams are made on.
Supreme Court Blocks Trials at Guantanamo
Associated Press, June 29, 2006
The Hidden Power
The New Yorker, July 3, 2006
A Supreme Court Conversation: Blank Checks
Slate.com, June 29, 2006
Will Hamdan Have Any Effect on the Bush Presidency?
Unclaimed Territory, June 28, 2006
Hamdan and the Youngstown Framework
American Constitution Society, June 29, 2006
Court and Spark: Gitmo Stonewall and Supreme Swift-Boating
Empire Burlesque, June 30, 2006
President Bush Responds to the Decision on Military Trials for Guantanamo Detainees
Congressional Quarterly Transcripts Wire, June 29, 2006
Hamdan as What We Make It
Balkinization.com, June 29, 2006
Death Wish: The Presidential Prerogative of Murder
Moscow Times, Nov. 2, 2001
Render Unto Caesar: The Rule of Law is Dead
Empire Burlesque, March 15, 2002
A slender victory for democracy
Boston Globe, July 1, 2006
Insanity Defense: Power, Paranoia and Presidential Tyranny
Empire Burlesque, June 29, 2006
Bringing It All Back Home: The Bush War on Liberty Intensifies
Empire Burlesque, June 27, 2006
Gonzales: Gitmo Ruling Hampered War on Terror
CNN, July 1, 2006
Bush Has Widened Authority of CIA to Kill Terrorists
New York Times, Dec. 15, 2002
Special Ops Get OK to Initiate Its Own Missions
Washington Times, Jan. 8, 2003
Our Designated Killers
Village Voice, Feb. 14, 2003
A U.S. License to Kill
Village Voice, Feb. 21, 2003
John Paul Stevens
Supreme Court Historical Society
We speak of course of the U.S. Supreme Court decision that struck down the ludicrous and lawless "military tribunals" concocted by President George W. Bush to serve as meat grinders for the captives in his War on Terror. Led by the sprightly 86-year-old Justice John Paul Stevens, a narrow court majority delivered a stinging rebuke to Bush's assumption of imperial powers over the past five years, clearly rejecting the fundamental principle underlying the Crawford Caligula's foul misrule: that the president's unbridled will is the law.
The ruling has been hailed as a "victory for democracy," the "light at the end of the tunnel," a "turning point" in the long struggle to reclaim the republic from the usurping junta of the Bush regime. But we have seen these lights before, and watched them fade. All the previous "turning points" -- scandals, atrocities, judicial rebuffs, investigations, convictions -- have only led to more depredations; every seeming defeat of unlawful power becomes instead a springboard for its further advancement. There is no reason to think it will be any different this time.
To be sure, Stevens and his allies fought a valiant rear-guard action on behalf of liberty. They could have restricted their response to the narrow technical points at issue in the case, but instead they took a broad scythe to the rank undergrowth of legal perversion spawned by the White House and its chief constitutional corrupter, David Addington, the ruthless vizier to Vice President Dick Cheney. As The New Yorker reports, all laws now pass through the hands of this unelected factotum, who feverishly screens them for any possible encroachments on presidential power -- then writes the "signing statements" that Bush appends to every major piece of legislation, declaring that he will follow the new law, or not, as it suits him. "I'm the decider," as Bush likes to say in his cretinous playground patois. But it is Addington and Cheney who have sown the noxious weeds of tyranny that Bush so happily grazes upon.
So there was rich irony in seeing their malevolent system chastised by Stevens, a conservative Republican whose 1975 appointment by President Gerald Ford was certainly handled by Ford's powerful chief of staff: an ambitious apparatchik named Dick Cheney. And the Stevens decision would indeed be a landmark ruling, a return to sanity -- if we were still in an era where the institutions of American government and society were actually functional, and officeholders felt bound by law. But if there is no political will in the American establishment to enforce the ruling, it will be nothing more than a pretty ornament for the republic's coffin.
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Indeed, for all its reputed obsession with secrecy, the Bush regime has been remarkably open about its usurpations. "Extrajudicial killing," torture, indefinite detention, mass surveillance, defiance of court rulings and Congress, employment of death squads, an unprovoked war of aggression -- all have been carried out openly, readily apparent to anyone with access to mainstream media sources. That the Supreme Court has only now challenged the essence of Bush's claim to authoritarian power is poignant testimony to how deep the rot of tyranny has spread.
Bush's reaction to the ruling is more evidence of the decay. After a vague, haughty promise to "look at the findings" -- rather than simply obey them, as the law requires -- Bush declared: "One thing I'm not going to do, though, is I'm not going to jeopardize the safety of the American people. People have got to understand that." Thus, in his mind, the circular reasoning that forms the core of his authoritarian philosophy remains intact: Any action that he arbitrarily declares necessary to ensure "the safety of the American people" cannot be restrained by laws or courts.
Already, the lickspittle, lock-step Congress is preparing to belch forth laws to retroactively legalize past Bush crimes and countenance future offenses. As legal scholar Mark Garber notes, this will likely satisfy at least one of the court's wavering moderates when the next test of Bush's tyranny comes around, sinking the razor-thin majority for liberty -- which will soon disappear in any case when the ancient Stevens shuffles off this mortal coil. His bold stroke for freedom was magic indeed, but it may prove, in the corrupted currents of this world, to be such stuff as dreams are made on.
Annotations
Supreme Court Blocks Trials at Guantanamo
Associated Press, June 29, 2006
The Hidden Power
The New Yorker, July 3, 2006
A Supreme Court Conversation: Blank Checks
Slate.com, June 29, 2006
Will Hamdan Have Any Effect on the Bush Presidency?
Unclaimed Territory, June 28, 2006
Hamdan and the Youngstown Framework
American Constitution Society, June 29, 2006
Court and Spark: Gitmo Stonewall and Supreme Swift-Boating
Empire Burlesque, June 30, 2006
President Bush Responds to the Decision on Military Trials for Guantanamo Detainees
Congressional Quarterly Transcripts Wire, June 29, 2006
Hamdan as What We Make It
Balkinization.com, June 29, 2006
Death Wish: The Presidential Prerogative of Murder
Moscow Times, Nov. 2, 2001
Render Unto Caesar: The Rule of Law is Dead
Empire Burlesque, March 15, 2002
A slender victory for democracy
Boston Globe, July 1, 2006
Insanity Defense: Power, Paranoia and Presidential Tyranny
Empire Burlesque, June 29, 2006
Bringing It All Back Home: The Bush War on Liberty Intensifies
Empire Burlesque, June 27, 2006
Gonzales: Gitmo Ruling Hampered War on Terror
CNN, July 1, 2006
Bush Has Widened Authority of CIA to Kill Terrorists
New York Times, Dec. 15, 2002
Special Ops Get OK to Initiate Its Own Missions
Washington Times, Jan. 8, 2003
Our Designated Killers
Village Voice, Feb. 14, 2003
A U.S. License to Kill
Village Voice, Feb. 21, 2003
John Paul Stevens
Supreme Court Historical Society