Do We Have the Legal Tools To Prevent Terrorist Attacks?
On Tuesday night, we attended a very interesting panel discussion, “Do We Have the Legal Tools to Prevent Terrorist Attacks?” It was sponsored by the New York City Lawyers Chapter of the Federalist Society, and it featured the following panelists:
Andrew C. McCarthy (no, not that Andrew McCarthy) — Senior Fellow, National Review Institute, and author, Willful Blindness: A Memoir of the Jihad.Glenn Sulmasy — Professor, U.S. Coast Guard Academy and author, The National Security Court System: A Natural Evolution of Justice in an Age of Terror.
Samuel J. Rascoff — Assistant Professor, NYU Law School and Former Director of Intelligence Analysis for the New York City Police Department and Special Assistant to the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq
Hon. Kenneth M. Karas — United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (moderator)
Read about the wide-ranging and thoughtful discussion, after the jump.
The youthful-looking Judge Karas — dressed in a dark grey suit and an impossibly crisp white shirt, probably dating back to his days as a prosecutor — introduced the panelists. He noted that Andrew McCarthy was his unit chief, in the legendary U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, and self-deprecratingly claimed that McCarthy “helped me avoid reversible error on numerous occasions.”
With respect to the panel topic, McCarthy framed the question this way: What is the nature of the problem? If we’re seeking to prevent terrorist acts, as opposed to just respond after the fact, then “the law of armed conflict has to be part of that solution.”
Relying solely on the criminal justice system is inadequate, according to McCarthy. In many cases, we know that someone means us harm, but are unable to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt — the standard of proof required in criminal cases. Furthermore, much of the evidence necessary for a criminal prosecution may be impossible to present in court, due in part to national security concerns.
Interrogation must be part of any prevention paradigm, McCarthy claimed — and officials charged with protecting the United States must have leeway to employ a broad range of interrogation measures. The public debate we’ve been having over the methods employed by the Bush Administration is “paralyzingly stupid,” McCarthy said.
Torture is a legal concept with a legal definition, and that definition was not met by the methods that are now the subject of debate. To characterize what was done as “torture” is to trivialize real acts of torture, according to McCarthy. We don’t want government officials engaged in the war on terror to constantly be looking over their shoulders, fearing professional ruin or criminal liability if they make a judgment called deemed wrong in hindsight.
The next speaker, Glenn Sulmasy, echoed many of McCarthy’s concerns. He argued that criminalizing policy preferences creates a dangerous chilling effect, preventing government officials from doing their jobs.
Professor Sulmasy identified two paradigms at work: the criminal justice paradigm, and the law of war paradigm. The war on terror is a hybrid conflict — terrorists are partly criminals, and partly warriors — and any response must be a hybrid solution. It makes no sense to employ only one of these paradigms — e.g., the criminal justice paradigm. Why should prisoners of war, captured on the battlefield, be given the full panoply of rights accorded to defendants in the criminal justice system?
Professor Sulmasy’s proposed solution: the creation of a national security court system. This judicial system, which would include Article III judges with expertise in both military and civilian legal systems, would protect human rights while also promoting national security. (That admittedly sounds like a tall order; for the details, check out his book.)
Sam Rascoff, the designated liberal foil for the evening, actually didn’t mix it up with the prior panelists as much as one might have expected (and he acknowledged as much in his remarks). He offered no call to coddle terrorists, to allow them to suck at the full constitutional teat. Rather, Rascoff wondered whether McCarthy and Sulmasy’s approaches to the issue might be too modest rather than too sweeping.
McCarthy and Sulmasy are focused primarily on what to do with a specific, limited group of people: detainees / terror suspects. But what we really need to do is address a broader question: What should be the law of counterterrorism? What bodies of law should be brought to bear upon the fight against terrorism?
Rascoff’s preferred approach — which sounds a bit Obamanian, but not in a way that upset the Fed Soc crowd — is to think of terrorism response as a regulatory and a risk management issue. He identified three tasks:
(1) Risk assessment: how do we gather intelligence (digression: harsh interrogation of terror suspects is like “a poor man’s form” of intelligence gathering, an after-the-fact substitute for inadequate human intelligence, e.g., agents who have managed to infiltrate al-Qaeda);
(2) Risk management: how do weigh the costs and benefits of different possible responses; and
(3) Intervention: what actions can we take to disrupt terrorist activities.
With respect to intervention, Rascoff explained, it’s not just a matter of locking people up. Other tactics might include targeted killings; the use of financial tools, to freeze the channels that fund terrorist activities; “the proverbial tap on the shoulder,” i.e., letting suspects know that they’re being watched; and projections of strength (like periodic police shows of force, when a gazillion police cars and officers flood the New York City streets).
The panelists’ presentations were rather academic, in a good way — thoughtful, sophisticated, nuanced. Another attendee observed: “That was an excellent panel. It’s so refreshing to hear the pros talk as they do: it’s entirely about security, with scarcely a touch of partisan point-scoring.”
It did get a touch more O”Reilly Factor in the question-and-answer session. Several highly conservative audience members asked aggressive questions of the presenters, suggesting that perhaps they need to be even more hawkish than they already are. Yes, there was bashing of the French.
Your above-signed scribe asked the panel: To what would you attribute the lack of major terrorist attacks on American soil since 9/11?
Andrew McCarthy cited the more comprehensive government response to terrorism in the wake of the September 11 attacks. Prior to 9/11, the war on terror was conducted primarily through the criminal justice system; after 9/11, there was a realization of the need to bring more parts of government to bear on the problem (e.g., military action, disruption of financial channels, etc.). Armed conflict has helped in this regard: “Killed and captured terrorists don’t blow stuff up.”
Glenn Sulmasy concurred, noting that “taking the fight to the terrorists” has certainly helped. The creation of the Department of Homeland Security was a critical step, as was the updating of FISA and the enhancement of our intelligence capabilities.
Samuel Rascoff began his response with an excellent quip: “This is not only a game of football; it’s also a game of chess.” We need to think strategically about combating terrorism — and, thankfully, “we’ve gotten a lot smarter [about these issues] in the last seven to eight years.”
Let’s hope that this trend continues. In any event, thanks to the Federalist Society for putting together an interesting and informative discussion.
Do We Have the Legal Tools to Prevent Terrorist Attacks? [Federalist Society]
(78) 
Comments
Dese mo'fuckas protect da' country...? It ain't no wonder why
the ship be sinking...
This is what I said six years ago:
"Official proclamation, June 2003:
THE WHITE HOUSE
Office of the Press Secretary
June 26, 2003
STATEMENT BY THE PRESIDENT
United Nations International Day in Support of Victims of Torture
Today, on the United Nations International Day in Support of Victims of Torture, the United States declares its strong solidarity with torture victims across the world. Torture anywhere is an affront to human dignity everywhere. We are committed to building a world where human rights are respected and protected by the rule of law.
Freedom from torture is an inalienable human right. The Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment, ratified by the United States and more than 130 other countries since 1984, forbids governments from deliberately inflicting severe physical or mental pain or suffering on those within their custody or control. Yet torture continues to be practiced around the world by rogue regimes whose cruel methods match their determination to crush the human spirit. Beating, burning, rape, and electric shock are some of the grisly tools such regimes use to terrorize their own citizens. These despicable crimes cannot be tolerated by a world committed to justice....
The United States is committed to the world-wide elimination of torture and we are leading this fight by example. I call on all governments to join with the United States and the community of law-abiding nations in prohibiting, investigating, and prosecuting all acts of torture and in undertaking to prevent other cruel and unusual punishment. I call on all nations to speak out against torture in all its forms and to make ending torture an essential part of their diplomacy. I further urge governments to join America and others in supporting torture victims' treatment centers, contributing to the UN Fund for the Victims of Torture, and supporting the efforts of non-governmental organizations to end torture and assist its victims.
No people, no matter where they reside, should have to live in fear of their own government. Nowhere should the midnight knock foreshadow a nightmare of state-commissioned crime. The suffering of torture victims must end, and the United States calls on all governments to assume this great mission."
Guess what - I didn't mean a word of it. If we do it, it ain't torture. If they do it, it's torture.
Rascoff is the man. Plain and simple. One of the best educators I've ever had.
The best tool is keeping tools -- i.e., Republicans -- out of office.
Those Federalists - they sure know how to put together a balanced panel incorporating many points of view.
What we need to prevent terrorism is the weirding way. either that or some king of voice amplified weapon that can boil a man's heart.
If waterboarding isn't torture, then why did the government try, convict and send to prison James Parker?
Who is James Parker? He was a Texas sheriff who, in 1983, was prosecuted, along with three of his deputies, by the Reagan Justice Department, for waterboarding men arrested for alleged drug offenses. During the trial, Assistant U.S. Attorney Scott Woodward said the men who were subjected to waterboarding were not “model citizens” but they were still “victims” of torture. “We make no bones about it. The victims of these crimes are criminals,” Woodward said, according to a copy of the trial transcript. One of the “victims” was Vernell Harkless, who was convicted of burglary in 1977. Gregg Magee, a deputy sheriff who testified against Sheriff Parker and three of the deputies said he witnessed Harkless being handcuffed to a chair by Parker and then getting “the water treatment.” “A towel was draped over his head,” Magee said, according to court documents. “He was pulled back in the chair and water was poured over the towel.” Harkless said he thought he was “going to be strangled to death,” adding: “I couldn't breathe.” One of the defendants, Deputy Floyd Allen Baker, said during the trial that he thought torture to be an immoral act but he was unaware that it was illegal. His attorneys cited the “Nuremberg defense,” that Baker was acting on orders from his superiors when he subjected the arrested men to waterboarding. Baker, along with the others, was convicted. As to Parker, he admitted that he had operated a “marijuana trap” on U.S. Highway 59, arrested suspects, and, according to court documents, subjected “prisoners to a suffocating water torture ordeal in order to coerce confessions. This generally included the placement of a towel over the nose and mouth of the prisoner and the pouring of water in the towel until the prisoner began to move, jerk, or otherwise indicate that he was suffocating and/or drowning,” the complaint said, which referred to the technique as “water torture.”
Can I just say, I love that the Fed. Soc. is irrelevant once again?
fed soc.'s response to GWOT is commerce clause, substantive dp, and torture. got it.
You should have asked, "To what would you attribute the major terrorist attacks that occurred on American soil *on* 9/11?" Or, "What exactly did the last administration do after receiving that Aug. 6, 2001 memo, 'Bin Laden Determined to Strike in the United States'?"
They want secret courts and call themselves Americans? They want to be able to interrogate people on American soil, away from the battlefield, without following the protections set forth in the Constitution? Yes, I realize that there may be some situations in which trials must be secret or sealed. But I don't want a different set of courts with a different set of judges making those decisions. If a judge in a "national security" court, is a complete intemperate jerkface, no one will be able to complain. If a judge in a standard federal court is, at least the parties in his or her "normal" cases will be in a position to critique him or her, and publicly appeal his or her decisions.
I would like them to explain exactly what terrorist attacks we have failed to prevent due to the lack of methods they endorse. Scary.
10,
What did Clinton do with similar reports? He bombed an aspirin factory.
The most articulate statement on the issue I've heard is that of the former pilot of the Enola Gay:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/aug/06/nuclear.japan
"Let's put it this way. I don't know any more about these terrorists than you do, I know nothing. When they bombed the Trade Centre I couldn't believe what was going on. We've fought many enemies at different times. But we knew who they were and where they were. These people, we don't know who they are or where they are. That's the point that bothers me. Because they're gonna strike again, I'll put money on it. And it's going to be damned dramatic. But they're gonna do it in their own sweet time. We've got to get into a position where we can kill the bastards. None of this business of taking them to court, the hell with that. I wouldn't waste five seconds on them."
If only we listened.
The question is a non-starter. Terrorists don't give a rat's ass "legal tools".
The Federalist Society invites all ATL readers to its next national security symposium:
"Waterboarding and Other Enhanced Interrogation Techniques: Clearly Legal and Necessary, or the Most Legal and Necessary Thing Ever?"
We are at risk because you tortured. How's that for a legal analysis.
Aren't judges supposed to avoid the appearance of bias? Appearing at a Federalist Society anything shows how biased Karas is. Reversible error found.
ATL, give it up! You're not convincing those of us who are not of a conservative view, and you're really just pissing us off! The Federalist Society is essentially a conservative think tank for every little rich boy wetting his panties to follow his Republican daddy. Clarence Thomas is an embarrassment to the Supreme Court, and Scalia, while mildly entertaining at times, spews complete bullshit in his opinions 95% of the time. S T O P ! ! !
16 - If that's the case, then half of SCOTUS is in trouble.
13,
If we don't know who the enemies are, or where they are, why should we use extra-legal methods to punish them? Wouldn't you be at least the teeniest bit worried that, because we don't know who they are, we might do shit to people who are not them?
Don't give a shit.
Torture is a legal concept with a legal definition, and that definition was not met by the methods that are now the subject of debate."
Wow, I guess that's it then. Debate over, man! Debate over! I wish I could close discussions so easily.
"To characterize what was done as "torture" is to trivialize real acts of torture, according to McCarthy."
Well, yeah, our waterboarding wasn't quite as bad their waterboarding, so that's fine. Saying that we "tortured" people doesn't in any way diminish the fact that other people, in other places, are "tortured." If anything, the fact that we "tortured" basically means that we can't complain when other people do the same thing.
"We don't want government officials engaged in the war on terror to constantly be looking over their shoulders, fearing professional ruin or criminal liability if they make a judgment called deemed wrong in hindsight."
Maybe they shouldn't, you know, break the law and torture people then. Or maybe they should be willing to torture, maybe breaking the law, and then stand up and accept responsibility for what they did. Let the legal system have its way and determine what punishment, if any, they deserve. Novel concept, no?
17--Ellie?
I stand by comments made by Jesse "The Body" Ventura:
"Water-boarding is torture... It's drowning. It gives you the complete sensation that you are drowning. It is no good, because you -- I'll put it to you this way; you give me a water board, Dick Cheney and one hour, and I'll have him confess to the Sharon Tate murders."
-- Former Governor Jesse Ventura, an ex-Seal who endured waterboarding as part of his training
"Torture is a legal concept with a legal definition, and that definition was not met by the methods that are now the subject of debate."
If that be true, then the legal definition of torture is in desperate need of serious modification. While it's all too easy for some to say that the simulation of drowning is not torture, it's quite another thing to actually believe it. And who does actually believe such a thing? The small percentage of the population that has never tried to touch the bottom of a 12ft. deep pool?
"Torture is a legal concept with a legal definition, and that definition was not met by the methods that are now the subject of debate."
If that be true, then the legal definition of torture is in desperate need of serious modification. While it's all too easy for some to say that the simulation of drowning is not torture, it's quite another thing to actually believe it. And who does actually believe such a thing? The small percentage of the population that has never tried to touch the bottom of a 12ft. deep pool?
Karas often appears on terrorism related panels. NYU's law and security center hosts a bunch of panels like this one and they're a bunch of lefties. I dont sense that Karas has a litmus test -- he goes to the NYU events as well as the Federalist events.
People complain when Lat writes up a Fed Soc event. But why don't people complain when Elie gets all liberal on us?
On the hell planet of Salusa Secondus, we have legal symposium where the speakers address how best to arrange laws so that more activities--not less--involve torture.
27 -
Apparently you do not frequent these pages.
I love these comments! As if there is no middle ground between the "lets suspend the constitution" camp and the "lets send the terrorists to shrinks for find out why they hate us" camp.
The problem with this "war on terror" is that it is indefinite and once we as a country accept the fact that we are going to constantly be in a state of "war" it won't be long before our civil liberties (at least whats left after the PATRIOT ACT) slip away. That said, I have no problem with the "enemy combatant" designation and really don't have a problem with
"torturing" terrorists outside the country.
'As if there is no middle ground between the "lets suspend the constitution" camp and the "lets send the terrorists to shrinks for find out why they hate us" camp.'
There is NO middle ground. You either stand with Muad'Dib, or against him.
30,
Leaving aside all moral arguments for a moment, physical coercion does not lead to the discovery of useful information. If you do not already know what a given opeative is up to (so that you cannot verify at least some of his or her statements) then you cannot successfully torture them, because you have to guess when they are lying, and once you guess wrong they just start telling you whatever causes them the least pain.
The best method is to have the best starting intelligence you can, and then pull all the interrogation techniques that good cops/FBI agents/private investigators do. If you can convince someone that you are friendly/sympathetic, most of them will spill.
So, 7, what's your point? That domestic policy should be constrained by the closing argument of some justice department flunkie from 20-odd years ago? Really? Because thats a pretty stupid point.
There are a lot of reasons to be against waterboarding, that just ain't one of them.
Right on, 17!
33, why, because YOU say it's "stupid." You must be a FANTASTIC lawyer.
Terrorism? Who's concerned about that? It's liberal activists judges that keep me up at night.
Rascoff is brilliant. He could be on the Supreme Court someday.
The torture issue just kills me. It's a principle thing, not a utilitarian/policy thing. You would think that at least the lawyers would understand that. If you shot someone's kneecap off, they'd probably tell you some, if not at all, of what you wanted to know. If you brought their family into the interrogation room, raped the detainee's wife, and began to sodomize the children, they would probably tell you something about what you want to know. BUT THAT'S NOT THE FUCKING ISSUE, YOU CONSERVATIVE FUCK-UPS!
The United States is not a country that tortures, which includes water-boarding, putting people in stress tests, "walling" (look it up) and whatever else the CIA or the disgusting contractors were doing. There are many countries that do torture and the fact they do correlates very highly with a lot of serious institutional problems these countries face (lack of rule of law, lack of independent judiciary, lack of speech and association rights). Andrew McCarthy is a smart guy, but even smart guys can be advocates for repulsive evil.
Amen, 38.
- not 38.
38,
I agree with you that it is a principal thing, but when I dispair of convincing people that they are amoral, I go for pragmatic arguments.
32
principle and despair. ack
32
32,
The fact that you misspelled something invalidates all opinions that you can ever express.
Is it too late to be first?
42,
Your sentence is awkwardly constructed. That alone invalidates all opinions you have.
38,
You live in a dream world. To defeat the enemy, you must become the enemy. We have been torturing enemy combatants for 200 years. The only difference now is that the press complains about it and the liberals get fired up.
Grow up.
38: As Tom Bodett said on Wait, Wait a few weeks back: The "torture works" argument is like a shoplifter defending himself on the grounds that "look at all this great stuff I got!"
stopped reading after "Andrew C. McCarthy" LOL @ "National Review Institute"
47: That's where they house the readers so they can't harm themselves or others.
45 - We had been enslaving people for thousands of years and it was the darn "liberals" that put an end to that. Guess they all should have just "grown up" and stopped whining, huh?
Rascoff is a neo-con shill. And he ain't no liberal. Anyone who worked for Paul Bremer's CPA is toast especially when Rascoff left that gig before the nation woke up to realize how badly Bush et al f**cked up Iraq.
Laughable that some dolt here thinks he is on someone's short list for Supreme Court.
42,
I actually misspelled TWO things. Fail.
-32
38
I couldn't disagree more.
The U.S. is a country that puts people in stress tests.
Why, just the other day I was walking past a hotel in Clearwater Florida and a nice man gave me a stress test right there on the street!
Here's the thing:
If you had to undergo waterboarding at the hands of an enemy (not administered in a controlled setting by fellow soldiers), you would think its torture. Waterboarding is torture. Eleven days of sleep deprivation is torture. Period. I don't care if you can somehow run through a ton of narrow little loopholes to string together a legal argument that those tactics aren't torture. Make those arguments with every bit of skill you have. Doesn't change the fact that those tactics constitute the use of torture.
As such, we should call them torture. We should admit the United States has used torture as a national security tactic. But I don't think the debate ends there. Why?
For lack of a better way of putting it, Al-Qaeda is comprised of some sick-a** dudes. I mean incredibly sick. I mean hijack planes and fly them into buildings housing tens of thousands of innocents civilians sick. Moreover, they are sick enough to do it again (or something similar...or something worse).
Consequently, maybe we SHOULD torture them. They are sick dudes trying to do sick things to innocent people. Maybe using torture is a way to present them from being successful (debateable point, I know). Personally, I disagree. I don't think the United States should torture. I know it sounds naive and simplistic, but I like to think we are better than that. Or at least we should aim to be. BUT, I also believe there is a strong argument to be made for torturing sick a** terrorists.
But please, please, lets cut the bullsh*t. Do not try to argue that the United States doesn't torture. We torture. Waterboarding and sleep deprivation for elevn days constitute torture. (Plus, does anyone believe that we haven't gone further than these particular techniques?) It is disingenous to have this debate on the grounds of whether the United States tortures. No one can seriously believe we don't.
The real debate, and I think it is a good one given the precarious nature of the world we live in, is whether we should continue to torture. The answer to that question, is not as easy as both sides make it out to be.
Given that I have $250,000 in student loans and no job, I would rather ride a Sandworm on Dune without maker hooks instead of whining over the definition of torture.
If we waterboard Dick Cheney for an hour as proposed by former Governor Ventura and he confesses to the Sharon Tate murders and being a closet homosexual with David Addington, then I would admit that torture works.
On Rascoff and SCOTUS:
"Samuel J. Rascoff (born 1973) is an American legal scholar and current Assistant Professor of Law at New York University School of Law. Rascoff came to the Law School from the New York City Police Department where he was the Director of Intelligence Analysis Unit. Rascoff is occasionally mentioned as a potential future United States Supreme Court nominee."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Samuel_Rascoff
We should waterboard Cheney to find out whether the Bush administration used torture.
After all, waterboarding isn't torture, so it's cool to use on Cheney, and doing this will make our nation safer.
The fundamental error here is that you can't commit war on criminals. The War Against Terrorism (or "TWAT") is a bullshit figure of speech that these people have used to create real legal consequences. Of course anyone who our troops meet on the field of war are subject to military law. However there are only two fields of war here: Iraq and Afghanistan. Using some state department psychos to abduct some terrorist psycho from his safe house in Sarajevo does not make that psycho (either one) subject to the law of war or military law.
Military justice is to justice what military music is to music--just fine for the people in uniform, but grossly inadequate for everyone else.
Obama needs to drop the TWAT paradigm and recognize that, while we are at war with the Taliban and all the various Iraqi Wolverine groups, we cannot be at war against a band of criminal thugs (though we can use the military to apprehend them and pressure those who harbor them). We can no more use the military to prosecute TWAT offenders than we can use the military to prosecute poor people (The War on Poverty) or illiterate people (The War on Illiteracy) or street-level crack dealers (The War on Drugs).
50: You're the dolt.
Yeah, that's what we need to deter terrorists, laws. To ensure terrorists know that they are breaking laws by blowing up buildings and people. And when they do engage in such acts, the "legal tools" will assist us in warding off these attacks.
What a fucking load of crap.
60, they cannot be deterred. The question is how we investigate their existence, and whether or not we are willing to trample on the rights of people who have not committed crimes to do so, and whether trampling on those rights will do anything to stop terrorism.
By saying that laws will not work against terrorists, you are begging the question and assuming that without some sort of legal or investigative framework, we can identify those who are committing crimes, whether for the purposes of terrorism or personal gratification.
What, no comments in the Carrer Center thread? I would go to Kirkland over any of those firms in about half a second. Then Quinn. Then Cleary. The rest are you just wouldn't want to be at whatever their Vault ranking or can't get hired at (ie. Wachtell).
Interesting that Latham and Weil aren't on the list. I wonder why. Oh, yeah. They either fire everyone or defer incoming associates to 2000 when-never
Lat = gay republican
"Do We Have the Legal Tools to Prevent Terrorist Attacks?" Maybe or maybe not. But the last administration didn't let the law get in the way of trying to torture confessions of a bogus connection between Iraq and Al-Qaeda out of detainees.
By the way, how did the terms "interesting panel discussion" and "Federalist Society" get into the same sentence? The two are mutually exclusive.
If WE don't adhere to our OWN laws and ethics, then WE are the terrorists in the eyes of the world, especially to rogue extremists. Get it?
"He argued that criminalizing policy preferences creates a dangerous chilling effect, preventing government officials from doing their jobs."
If the policy involves commission of crimes, it's criminal. Furthermore, if government officials are committing crimes or conspiring to commit crimes, they are not doing their jobs. Government officials, especially those who have the responsibility for interpreting the law, should be constantly aware of the legal limits to their authority. Of course, this isn't a case where government officials were simply ignorant of the law because they were so busy doing their jobs; rather, it's a case where government officials responsible for interpreting the law appeared to try to subvert it and strip it of all meaning.
NO MORE Anti-Terrorism LEGAL TOOLS!
(Democrats and terrorists AGREE.)
LIBERALISM IS A MENTAL DISORDER.
LIBERALISM IS A MENTAL DISORDER.
LIBERALISM IS A MENTAL DISORDER.
Please get help if you voted for Obama.
First step is acceptance.
Soon you will get to the step that requires you apologize to the rest of us.
LIBERALISM IS A MENTAL DISORDER.
LIBERALISM IS A MENTAL DISORDER.
LIBERALISM IS A MENTAL DISORDER.
While I may disagree with the Bush administration's overly technical interpretation of the laws governing torture, given the unique situation we faced after 911 as well as precedent set during WWII, no one but the most blatant partisan can say with a straight face that the lawyers were "criminals."
You know, in ancient Rome, every time a new consul was elected, they would spend their first few months "trying" cases against their predecessor for so-called "crimes against the state," which were really nothing more than policy differences. The new administration would come in, declare the old one to be criminals, hold show trials, and then confiscate their property and execute their families.
We start down a dangerous road when we start criminalizing legal opinions with which we disagree.
So sad, victimy republicans have no ideas, no policy, and no coherent argument, so they just kick and scream and whine like tiny little Rush Limboughs.
68 = case in point. You're a disgrace to normal repubs.
Everyone knows that the only reason Cheney loves waterboarding is because he was the nerdy little weirdo that got swirlies as a kid. Now it's payback time.
Everyone knows that the only reason Cheney loves waterboarding is because he was the nerdy little weirdo that got swirlies as a kid. Now it's payback time.
Fed Soc = pasty, fat, white, mouth-breathing, closet NAMBLA members
68--You are a moron. That is all...btw, call it what you will; EIT, waterboarding, torture...it's all the same crap. Here's a litmus test; what would the consequences be if our troops were the victims of these punishments? Prediction, the Rethugs, Rush, Krauthammer, Hannity and all the other apologists would be up in arms, condemning this behavior. The moral relativism is delicious...and the Federalist Society can suck it.....
Federalist Society = dorks who can't get laid and are angry about it.
- lady lawyer
Federalist Society = dorks who can't get laid and are angry about it.
- lady lawyer
56 - wow, it is on wikipedia so it MUST be true!
Rascoff has a good flair for self-promotion. He was in the right place at the right time (if he hadn't studied Arabic, none of us would know his name). He has accomplished precious little except collect baubles for his resume. At Wachtell he slaved away on the WTC insurance clusterfuck on behalf of Larry Silverstein (it sounds much more impressive to call it "complex litigation" though to be fair that is what it was, but since dozens and dozens of lawyers worked on it, I think it precious to give Rascoff any special credit). His CPA experience was nothing more than an all-expense paid vacation that benefited no one but himself (interesting how every account of the CPA story describes the period when Rascoff was there as precisely the time when every bad CPA decision was made which then set the stage for the horrific violence and civil war of 2004-2007 which conveniently occurred after Rascoff was safely esconced in his mid-Manhattan offices - if he had such firsthand access to all the CPA decision-making why didn't he do anything to prevent Bremer's piss-poor judgment).
As for his stint at NYPD, he served as a pawn for Raymond Kelly and was probably hoping it would set him up for some nice counter-terrorism job with the Bush regime or his hoped-for GOP successor.
With the GOP far from appointing judges for the foreseeable future I think that Mr. Rascoff's fantasies about being a young SCOTUS embed are safely off the table.
77: Seems like you are a little jealous that the man has achieved more than you. Your knack for pointing out some correlative results has nothing to do with the fact that the guy is a genius, and not only that he's a stand-up guy. You sound like a jealous whiner who is standing behind a veil of anonymity to further some complex you have developed along the way. Maybe he was a classmate of yours and you wonder why you haven't reached such success. Maybe in high school he was part of the popular crowd and you weren't. It's so blatantly clear that you have some sort of ill-founded contempt for someone who, even in your account, has done NOTHING WRONG!!!