Showing posts with label Michael Ratner. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Michael Ratner. Show all posts

21.5.09

Civil libertarians on Obama's speech adressing Guantanamo: All bells and whistles

Barely four months into the job, read what constitutional lawyer Michael Ratner had to say to the Huffington Post on Obama, Guantanamo, Torture, and military tribunals:
"He wraps himself in the Constitution, talks about American values and then proceeds to violate them."
..."Though we'd do it differently then Bush. We will set up rules. Well no matter how you repackage Guantanamo, with all kinds of rules on top of it -- that is what he is doing, he is re-wrapping a preventive detention scheme and giving it some more due process. In the end, it still comes down to holding people -- much like Minority Report or pre-crime stuff -- for being dangerous, and that is not something that I think is constitutional or this country should be engaged in."
..."I always believe that democracy dies behind closed doors, and the fact that these photos are being hidden right now -- if anything, it makes people think that there is a lot being hidden right now and that there is much more to this."
..."What is unfortunately effective about Obama is that he is able to use a setting like the National Archives, talk about the Constitution and the Bill of Rights and all that, get people to sincerely believe he is [committed to these principles] and then go ahead and in my view undercut the core aspects of those documents,"
 
Since March 29th 2006