Elaine Cassell of Civil Liberties Watch on Score Another One For Secret Trials: Court Hands Bush Big Win:
For those of you hoping the federal courts will save you from the abuses of freedom foisted upon you by the Congress who brought us the USA Patriot Act and Bush, Rumsfeld, and Ashcroft, who brought us the "war on terror," I have bad news to report. Yet another federal appeals court has slammed the door on public interest groups trying to stem the power of the government to detain, arrest, try, and deport people in secret.
Yes, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia said that all those nameless and faceless detainees who were rounded up by Ashcroft and his henchmen after 9/11, who were abused by the government as reported by the DOJ Inspector General last week, they all have the right to privacy! Now you and I don't have the right to privacy, common ordinary people charged with anything from jaywalking to murder, no siree, we have no right to privacy. Anyone can walk into any courthouse and get our criminal records.
This doesn't protect us from terrorism, so much as it protects the Administration from pesky stuff like Freedom of Information Act requests and public accountability.
Since there is now only one branch of government, Congress ought to disband the courts and send the judges packing. If you think this decision is bad, wait until those new Bush appointees don their robes. Dissents will be even rarer than they are today–all part of the Bush-Rove plan. Yesterday the Congress, today the Courts, tomorrow the Constitution.
I heard that sister. But, while I hold out little hope for our struggling Republic, this shit ain't over yet.
Link courtesy of Rational Review News Digest.