Continuance Granted in Gitmo Cases

Yesterday, the Obama administration requested a continuance in the military commissions trials scheduled for this week. This morning, the judges granted that request.

The suspensions granted today apply to both the five men charged in the 9/11 attacks and to Canadian Omar Khadr, a young man who was captured when still a teenager. His case is the most critical at this point. His defense attorneys have evidence he was abused and tortured while in custody at Guantanamo, and while he should have been held in compliance with treaties and international agreements on the treatment of child soldiers, he's been held as an adult.

The 120-day suspension "has the practical effect of stopping the process, probably forever," said Navy Lt. Cmdr. William Kuebler, Khadr's defense lawyer.

Khadr, a Toronto native, faces charges that include supporting terrorism and murder for allegedly killing U.S. Army Sgt. 1st Class Christopher Speer of Albuquerque, New Mexico, with a grenade during a 2002 battle in Afghanistan when he was 15.

Khadr, the son of an alleged al-Qaida militant who was slain by Pakistani forces in 2003, faces up to life in prison if convicted by the military commission. His lawyer says he should now be prosecuted, if at all, in a civilian court, though he would prefer to be repatriated to Canada.

"He is anxious. He doesn't know what's going to happen, none of us knows what's going to happen," Kuebler said after discussing the delay with the 22-year-old prisoner. "But we are all hopeful and somewhat optimistic that this ruling now creates a space for the two governments to do something constructive to solve this case."

The suspension allows the new administration time to determine how to proceed in these cases. In another development in the Guantanamo cases, the administration has announced that fired U.S. Attorney David Iglesias is now part of a special prosecution team for Guantanamo detainees that will be determining how to go forward.

"One hundred percent of what I'm doing is prosecuting terrorist cases out of Guantanamo," he said.

Igleisas explained that he had already begun the work, having travelled to the facility once, and expecting to go back.

"It's the most significant set of orders I've had in my 24 years of navy service," he added. "The level of detail that I'm looking into some of these terrorist groups, it just takes my breath away."

And he signaled what seemed to be a change in tone from the Bush years. "We want to make sure that those terrorists that did commit acts will be brought to justice -- and those that did not will be released."

Those that are "brought to justice" should be given actual justice, tried in existing federal criminal courts. The military commission trials have proven to be little more than kangaroo courts, show trials devised for maximum PR benefit but not for justice. Any kind of continuation of the military commissions system doesn't provide the sharp break from Bush administration policies the world is asking for.

Update: Via Jeralyn at TalkLeft, Switzerland has stepped up to say it is willing to consider accepting Guantanamo detainees. Also, for reinforcement of just how critical it is that the kangaroo military commission trials end, read Glenn.

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!

President Obama's Address to WH Staff on Ethics,
Pay Freeze, and more

.msnbcLinks {font-size:11px; font-family:Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; color: #999; margin-top: 5px; background: transparent; text-align: center; width: 425px;} .msnbcLinks a {text-decoration:none !important; border-bottom: 1px dotted #999 !important; font-weight:normal !important; height: 13px;} .msnbcLinks a:link, .msnbcLinks a:visited {color: #5799db !important;} .msnbcLinks a:hover, .msnbcLinks a:active {color:#CC0000 !important;}

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Transcript is after the jump...

REMARKS BY THE PRESIDENT

IN WELCOMING SENIOR STAFF AND CABINET SECRETARIES

 TO THE WHITE HOUSE

Room 450

Eisenhower Executive Office Building

1:18 P.M. EST

     THE PRESIDENT:  Hello, everybody.  Please be seated.  Still getting used to that whole thing.  (Laughter.)  Please be seated.  Thank you so much.  I wanted to get everyone together on the first day to welcome you to the White House. 

     From our vantage point yesterday you couldn't help but be inspired by the sight of Americans as far as the eye could see.  They were there because they believe this is a moment of great change in America, a time for reinvigorating our democracy and remaking our country.  They've entrusted all of us with a great responsibility.  And so today I'd like to talk with you about our responsibility to keep that trust.

     In a few minutes I'm going to be issuing some of the first executive orders and directives of my presidency.  And these steps are aimed at establishing firm rules of the road for my administration and all who serve in it, and to help restore that faith in government, without which we cannot deliver the changes we were sent here to make -- from rebuilding our economy and ensuring that anyone who is willing to work and find a well-paying job, to protecting and defending the United States, and promoting peace and security.

     However long we are keepers of the public trust we should never forget that we are here as public servants and public service is a privilege.  It's not about advantaging yourself.  It's not about advancing your friends or your corporate clients.  It's not about advancing an ideological agenda or the special interests of any organization.  Public service is, simply and absolutely, about advancing the interests of Americans. 

     The men and women in this room understand this, and that's why you're here.  All of you are committed to building a more responsible, more accountable government.  And part of what that means is making sure that we're spending precious tax dollars wisely and cutting costs wherever possible.

     During this period of economic emergency, families are tightening their belts, and so should Washington.  And that's why I'm instituting a pay freeze on the salaries of my senior White House staff.  Some of the people in this room will be affected by the pay freeze, and I want you to know that I appreciate your willingness to agree to it, recognizing that it's what's required of you at this moment.  It's a mark of your commitment to public service.

     But the American people deserve more than simply an assurance that those who are coming to Washington will serve their interests.  They also deserve to know that there are rules on the books to keep it that way.  They deserve a government that is truly of, by, and for the people.  As I often said during the campaign, we need to make the White House the people's house.  And we need to close the revolving door that lets lobbyists come into government freely, and lets them use their time in public service as a way to promote their own interests over the interests of the American people when they leave.

     So today we are taking a major step towards fulfilling this campaign promise.  The executive order on ethics I will sign shortly represents a clean break from business as usual.  As of today, lobbyists will be subject to stricter limits than under any other administration in history.  If you are a lobbyist entering my administration, you will not be able to work on matters you lobbied on, or in the agencies you lobbied during the previous two years.  When you leave government,  you will not be able to lobby my administration for as long as I am President.  And there will be a ban on gifts by lobbyists to anyone serving in the administration, as well.

     Now, the new rules on lobbying alone, no matter how tough, are not enough to fix a broken system in Washington.  That's why I'm also setting new rules that govern not just lobbyists, but all those who have been selected to serve in my administration.

If you are enlisting in government service, you will have to commit in writing to rules limiting your role for two years in matters involving people you used to work with, and barring you from any attempt to influence your former government colleagues for two years after you leave.  And you will receive an ethics briefing on what is required of you to make sure that our government is serving the people's interests, and nobody else's  -- a briefing, I'm proud to say, I was the first member of this administration to receive last week. 

     But the way to make a government responsible is not simply to enlist the services of responsible men and women, or to sign laws that ensure that they never stray.  The way to make government responsible is to hold it accountable.  And the way to make government accountable is make it transparent so that the American people can know exactly what decisions are being made, how they're being made, and whether their interests are being well served.

     The directives I am giving my administration today on how to interpret the Freedom of Information Act will do just that.  For a long time now, there's been too much secrecy in this city.  The old rules said that if there was a defensible argument for not disclosing something to the American people, then it should not be disclosed.  That era is now over.  Starting today, every agency and department should know that this administration stands on the side not of those who seek to withhold information but those who seek to make it known.

     To be sure, issues like personal privacy and national security must be treated with the care they demand.  But the mere fact that you have the legal power to keep something secret does not mean you should always use it.  The Freedom of Information Act is perhaps the most powerful instrument we have for making our government honest and transparent, and of holding it accountable.  And I expect members of my administration not simply to live up to the letter but also the spirit of this law.

     I will also hold myself as President to a new standard of openness.  Going forward, anytime the American people want to know something that I or a former President wants to withhold, we will have to consult with the Attorney General and the White House Counsel, whose business it is to ensure compliance with the rule of law.  Information will not be withheld just because I say so.  It will be withheld because a separate authority believes my request is well grounded in the Constitution.

     Let me say it as simply as I can:  Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency.

     Our commitment to openness means more than simply informing the American people about how decisions are made.  It means recognizing that government does not have all the answers, and that public officials need to draw on what citizens know.  And that's why, as of today, I'm directing members of my administration to find new ways of tapping the knowledge and experience of ordinary Americans -- scientists and civic leaders, educators and entrepreneurs -- because the way to solve the problem of our time is -- the way to solve the problems of our time, as one nation, is by involving the American people in shaping the policies that affect their lives.

     The executive orders and directives I'm issuing today will not by themselves make government as honest and transparent as it needs to be.  And they do not go as far as we need to go towards restoring accountability and fiscal restraint in Washington.  But these historic measures do mark the beginning of a new era of openness in our country.  And I will, I hope, do something to make government trustworthy in the eyes of the American people in the days and weeks, months and years to come.  That's a pretty good place to start.

     Thank you very much.  (Applause.)

     (The executive order and directives are signed.)  (Applause.)

     THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you.  Lisa, our schedule now -- the swearing-in is going to be taking place, and the Vice President is going to be carrying that out?  Okay. 

     Before the Vice President does that, let me just say how proud I am of all of you.  This is an extraordinary collection of talent, and you inspire great confidence in me.  I think the more the American people get to know you, the more you will inspire great confidence in the American people.  All of you have made extraordinary sacrifices to be here.  Many of you have brought your families here; they're making extraordinary sacrifices. 

     But what a -- what a moment we're in.  What an opportunity we have to change this country.  And for those of us who have been in public life before, these kinds of moments come around just every so often.  The American people are really counting on us now.  Let's make sure we take advantage of it.  I know you will.  So thank you for your commitment.

     Joe, do you want to administer the oath?

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Am I doing this again?

     THE PRESIDENT:  For the senior staff.

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  For the senior staff, all right. 

     THE PRESIDENT:  Yes.  A number of Cabinet members have already --

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  My memory is not as good as Justice Roberts, Chief Justice Roberts.  (Laughter.)  Okay, no, I -- this is the list.  Do you have a copy of the oath?  Which senior staff are we doing?

     THE PRESIDENT:  A whole bunch of senior staff.

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Okay.  All of the senior staff --

     THE PRESIDENT:  Rise.

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  -- please rise.  I will say "aye," and then you repeat your name. 

     THE PRESIDENT:  Marvin, button up your coat.  (Laughter.)

     (Senior staff are sworn in.)

     THE VICE PRESIDENT:  Congratulations.

     Mr. President -- our senior staff.  (Applause.)

                                            END        1:31 P.M. EST

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!

This Quintessence of Dust

I have of late--but
wherefore I know not--lost all my mirth, forgone all custom of exercises; and indeed it goes so heavilywith my disposition that this goodly frame, the earth, seems to me a sterile promontory, this most excellent canopy, the air, look you, this brave o'erhanging firmament, this majestical roof fretted with golden fire, why, it appears no other thing to me than a foul and pestilent congregation of vapours. What piece of work is a man! how noble in reason! how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express and admirable! in action how like an angel!in apprehension how like a god! the beauty of the
world! the paragon of animals! And yet, to me,
what is this quintessence of dust?
Wm. Shakespeare (Hamlet, Act II, Sc. 2)

I have experienced, at turns,  grief, suffering and depression during the past eight years. And at times, I thought that I would never embrace the world the way that I had when I was younger. I thought often of how I could kill myself without making it look like a suicide. I fantasized the accidental death, the release from all of this; I wanted the sleep of the dead. No dreams. No nightmares. Just nothingness.
Hamlet's "No more."  
I had lost my way. I couldn't appreciate the spectacular or the mundane. Numbness enveloped me. I went to the mall and bought things. Gave gifts to my friends. Ate extravagant meals. Bought outrageous clothes. Still, I was miserable.

And yet, now I greet each day as a gift. I have found balance between feelings that as a human I am nothing, and that as a human I have the potential to change worlds. What happened? It wasn't one big life-changing epiphany. I waited for meaning to reveal itself to me like the prize behind Door Number Three. But it didn't come, and at times, I took tremendous comfort from reading Albert Camus' The Myth of Sisyphus. Yes. We spend our days pushing the weight before us. But Camus imagined Sisyphus happy, and so, imagining myself Sisyphus, I resolved to smile.

What really needed to happen was that I needed to learn to love my own company. My quest for companionship, my absolute terror of loneliness, had led me to do a lot of stupid, sometimes dangerous things.

Six years ago, I was in Seattle. A friend who knew I was homesick had flown me out to spend a few days. I wandered the U-District-the funky, noisy area close to the University of Washington-a place I had spent years. The U-District had changed, but not so much and I found myself going in and out of cafes, restaurants, and shops that I had frequented as an undergraduate, and later, as a married graduate student with a small child. Here I was, back again after eight years away. I admit, I hoped that being there would help me understand where I was.

What had once been an ice cream shop had become a coffee house. I remember that the light was thick and golden, the air disturbed by the door that opened and closed as each person entered, and I was sad. I had been dumped just before the trip, and I felt bruised and worn out around the edges. I'm not sure what serendipity had led me to buy a book at the U's bookstore, but as I read the words, I knew that I was reading what I needed to hear. Yes, it was epiphany. But not those bullshit epiphanies they give you in movies. This was the tiny corner of one, and it was up to me to do the work that would reveal the rest.

Rainer Maria Rilke was advising a young poet about life, about art, about learning to love the self, about learning to trust one's own company.

And to speak of solitude again, it becomes always clear that this is at bottom not something that one can take or leave. We are solitary. We may delude ourselves and act as though this were not so. That is all. But ... we must assume our existence as broadly as we in any way can; everything, even the unheard-of, must be possible in it. That is at bottom the only courage that is demanded of us: to have courage for the most strange, the most singular and the most inexplicable that we may encounter. That mankind has in this sense been cowardly has done life endless harm...For it is not inertia alone that is responsible for human relationships repeating themselves from case to case, indescribably monotonous and unrenewed; it is shyness before any sort of new, unforeseeable experience with which one does not think oneself ready to cope. But only someone who is ready for everything, who excludes nothing, not even the most enigmatical, will live the relation to another as something alive and will himself draw exhaustively from his own existence... We have no reason to mistrust our world, for it is not against us. Has it terrors, they are our terrors; has it abysses, those abysses belong to us; are dangers at hand, we must try to love them.

Rilke is not an easy read. His writing is so full that I have found it necessary to read and re-read passages, only to discover that my understanding of that passage has changed as time has gone by. Or as my life has gone by. But Rilke is telling us two things: we must embrace the fact that we are alone and not be overwhelmed by that; and we must embrace the fact that the world will offer to us things that we don't understand at the time they are offered, but they are huge gifts, and if we can accept them, our boundaries will expand.

If I was to make changes as an individual, if I were to develop a different way of being with myself so that I might be different when in the company of others, that then would be my way out of the pit into which I had fallen. It was incumbent upon me to stop using people to fill the gaps in my life, to stop using people to keep me from having to be alone, to stop using people-even if I believed my intentions were good.

And thus began a long, slow process of finding comfort in my own company. May Sarton once said (I'm paraphrasing) that "loneliness is the absence of the self; solitude is the company of the self. " As an artist, creation needed to take place in solitude. It didn't mean that I had to go wall myself up as an anchoress; it meant that I had to learn to sit and be quiet and hear what was going on within me.

The process is not unlike what I've experienced when I've been hiking in the mountains. The trip up the side of a mountain path is exhilarating and exhausting. When you're making elevation gains in short bursts, your legs ache, your heart speeds up with the effort. But your insides-well your insides feel as if they are going to burst when you see the what is being revealed to you as you climb. And, when you have finished climbing, you admire the view, and then you return whence you came-but you're changed by the experience.
The innovation that we need to change our culture is this, I think. My wish for humanity is that each of us as individuals find a way to take pleasure in our own company. This is not to say that we should stop being social animals. I don't mean that at all. But I believe that if each of us could get quiet with ourselves, could spend days thinking and creating and revering this earth upon which we carry out our lives, that these collective actions done individually will change our culture.

Without the grasping need that loneliness fills us with, perhaps we would have less desire for "things." We would feel less driven to mine the earth and strip her of her riches. We would feel less need to want what someone else has. We would channel our energies into creating a more just world, and inhabit an earth that will be able to recover itself once we stop stripping it bare in our desperation to find something meaningful.
Meaning lies within each of us. It isn't immediately apparent. You have to work to find it, and the beginning of that experience is done alone, within ourselves, as we accept that the things that are out of control that happen to us are part of the ebb and flow of an ordinary life. But the ordinary life is worth living.  

Read The Full Article:
http://www.myleftwing.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=24171

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!

Aboard the Bush Plane (Mark McKinnon/Blogs and
Stories)

Mark McKinnon / Blogs and Stories:
Aboard the Bush Plane  —  Britain's Leading Historian on the Genius of Obama's Unsoaring Inaugural  —  Full Coverage: Obama Inauguration, Bush Farewell  —  Blogs and Stories  —  In a Daily Beast exclusive, a former Bush advisor files his account—and his photos—from aboard the former president's flight back to Texas.

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!

Mark Crispin Miller: Roberts' 'Bush moment'

A BUZZFLASH GUEST CONTRIBUTION
by Mark Crispin Miller

With the whole world watching, Chief Justice Roberts garbled up Obama's oath of office yesterday -- deliberately, some say, since the new president must speak his piece precisely, and Roberts made that quite impossible (unless Obama had decided to ignore his clumsy prompts, and do it right entirely on his own).

"I'm relatively certain they re-administered the oath out of view of the masses to make it all legit," writes a friend. "I say he screwed it up on purpose." That could be, although, if so, it would be a pretty brazen move.

I'd say that Roberts didn't do it consciously, but that his screw-up was a stark bit of unconscious interference with Obama's swearing-in. Roberts is, of course, a flaming Bush Republican -- and, as such, intent on (further) disenfranchising the very citizens who voted, or tried to vote, for Obama/Biden.

For example, Roberts has been on (what we might call) the Klan side of every Supreme Court decision that pertains to voting rights since he was placed on that almighty body. He voted to uphold the Indiana photo ID law, having made some idiotic arguments defending it in open court.

The stated purpose of the law was to halt in-person "voter fraud" in Indiana. Replying to the point that there was not a single case of such fraud ever having been discovered in that state, Roberts noted that such lack of evidence was no surprise, since "voter fraud" is, by its very nature, secret, and therefore leaves no traces. (Cf. Rumsfeld's Law: "Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.") And upon hearing that ID-less Indiana voters have to cast provisional ballots, and then travel to the county seat to get them counted, Roberts said that that was not a hardship, since county seats in Indiana aren't so far away.
Bookmark/Search this post with: buzzflash | delicious | digg | yahoo | technorati Technorati Tags: Guest Contribution Mark Crispin Miller Voter Rights Act Supreme Court John Roberts Barack Obama flubbed oath

read more

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!

REBUILDING WITH THE PA

The first press release from White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs highlights Obama's early efforts to engage with Gaza:"This morning, the President placed phone calls to four Middle Eastern leaders: President Mubarak of Egypt, Prime Minister Olmert[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://www.prospect.org/csnc/blogs/ezraklein_archive?month=01&year=2009&base_name
=rebuilding_with_the_pa

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!

DNC Winter Meeting Wherein Dean Passes The Torch

I'm at the DNC Winter Meeting. It is Governor Dean's final meeting as chair and is where Tim Kaine will officially be elected as chair. Dean just received a ridiculously long standing ovation. He's speaking now. Update [2009-1-21 13:42:5 by Todd[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/mydd/~3/STylbayuKFo/260

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!

Bush: Good Boy Scouts Leave Their Camp Better
Than They Found It

It'd be nice if Bush applied the Boy Scout standard to himself and STFU about his accomplishments.[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://firedoglake.com/2009/01/21/bush-boy-scouts-leave-their-camp-better-than-th
ey-found-it/

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!

Mosul Forces Hunt for Cop Shooters

MOSUL - Police are hunting for gunmen who opened fire on a policemen from a vehicle in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on Wednesday, wounding him as he traveled to his workplace in the morning.

Read The Full Article:
http://www.iraqslogger.com/index.php/post/7024

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!

Setting the Bar

Obama: "Transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency." [...]

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Talking-Points-Memo/~3/_GoQNKZg9gw/setting_the_bar
_1.php

Add to del.icio.us

Digg this

Post to Furl

Add to reddit

Add to myYahoo!