http://uchicagolaw.typepad.com…..amdan.html

Too many comments to check.

Sorry, I had to go and missed your follow-up.
I was a USAF F-4 Fighter Crew Chief. I went to tech school at Sheppard AFB, Witchita Falls, TX, and then TOT Training at Seymour Johnson AFB, Goldsboro, NC. We did a SERE thing but not the GI Jane thing you gals go through. We are the ‘Chair Force’ afterall. But there was a lot of survival training and weapons training and I carried a sidearm while on the flightline. Anyway, hope you get this or someone mentions it in another thread. Take care, there weren’t many of us girls out on the line in those days, matter of fact I was the only woman on the flightline in my squadron. Ah, the ‘good ole days’. Glad its over.

Perhaps foolishly, I keep coming back to Article VI of the US Constitution:

… all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.

Such treaties would include the Geneva Conventions. And (as I understand it), in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled the specific applicability of Article 3 of the Geneva convention to detainees in the Global War on Terror.

Also, per the War Crimes Act of 1996:

[Any U.S. national who] commits a war crime [including any “grave breach in any of the international conventions signed at Geneva 12 August 1949, or any protocol to such convention to which the United States is a party”] … if the victim dies, shall … be subject to the penalty of death.

This give me hope that members of the media will ultimately be brought to justice.

Bombing the power plant at Gaza is against international law. Google collective punishment and click on the Israeli human rights group site B T’Selem. Women and children are dying. It’s illegal. We shouldn’t use such tactics and we damned sure shouldn’t allow our allies to do so.

That’s what I take from the Supreme Court ruling. And I’m very grateful for that little good news this week …

Justice Scalia noted that if the court had not denied retroactive application of this jurisdiction stripping statute, it would have had to deal with the provision of the Constitution which states that the Writ of “habeas corpus shall not be suspended, unless when in cases of rebellion or invasion the public safety may require it.”

The bad news for lovers of freedom is that the power of the Great Writ to survive Congress’ efforts to strip the Supreme Court of jurisdiction is still in doubt. .

In order to deny retroactive effect to the jurisdiction stripping provisions of the DTA, the majority looked at the legislative and drafting history of the statute, including the statements of various Senators made during the debate. The dissenters criticized the manner in which this was done, arguing that the statements were quoted selectively.

What I find especially troubling is this parenthetical remark in Scalia’s (and Thomas’s and Scalito’s) discussion of the majority’s perusal of legislative history:

(Of course in its discussion of legislative history the Court wholly ignores the President’s signing statement, which explicitly set forth his understanding that the DTA ousted jurisdiction over pending cases.)

I first wrote about the pernicious signing statements on January 4, 2006, here and here.

It should be observed that when Congress passes a law, the President can sign it or veto it. He knows what is the congressional intent, and he chooses whether to agree or disagree. If he disagrees, then Congress has an opportunity to over-ride the veto. But Bush does not veto bills: he just ignores them. Does Congress have any recourse?

Well, there is always the impeachment thing.

For more, visit the Schapira blog, What we know so far

” … and tell ‘em Big Mitch sent ya!”

But the real blockbuster in the Hamdan decision is the court’s holding that Common Article 3 of the Geneva Convention applies to the conflict with Al Qaeda – a holding that makes high-ranking Bush administration officials potentially subject to prosecution under the federal War Crimes Act.
…
Under federal criminal law, anyone who “commits a war crime … shall be fined … or imprisoned for life or any term of years, or both, and if death results to the victim, shall also be subject to the penalty of death.” And a war crime is defined as “any conduct … which constitutes a violation of Common Article 3 of the international conventions signed at Geneva.” In other words, with the Hamdan decision, U.S. officials found to be responsible for subjecting war on terror detainees to torture, cruel treatment or other “outrages upon personal dignity” could face prison or even the death penalty.

If I recall correctly, at Nuremburg, they held the propagandists who supported and justified the war crimes to be equally guilty, e.g., the death penalty for Bill Kristol and John Yoo.

Emptywheel? you up for this, too? I’ll contact Frank P. up north and ask the same.