Excerpts from an editorial in the International Herald Tribune yesrerday:
We are, sadly, accustomed to hearing President George W. Bush’s lawyers justify this administration’s ceaseless efforts to undermine the constitution and the rule of law: Intrusions on privacy, warrantless wiretapping, indefinite detention, torture.
It was bad enough when Attorney General Alberto Gonzales helped write and defend these policies; he always made clear his loyalties were to Bush, not the United States. But it was appalling to hear his successor, Michael Mukasey — who was supposed to be better — demanding that Congress further expand Bush’s power to detain foreigners without charges or reliable evidence, and further evade judicial oversight.
In a speech last Monday, Mukasey renewed the administration’s criticism of Supreme Court rulings on detainees. The court has ruled in several cases that Bush and then Congress, at his insistence, illegally denied the Guantanamo prisoners the basic human right to challenge their detention in court. He demanded that Congress swiftly pass measures that would sharply reduce the possibility that any Guantanamo prisoner could have a fair hearing. Mukasey offered six principles that should drive such legislation — including keeping secrets secret, limiting prisoners’ access to evidence, and not inconveniencing the military. America’s chief law enforcement officer never mentioned the rule of law or justice. It would be catastrophically irresponsible for Congress to rewrite the rules of justice according to Mukasey’s cynical template. There has been too much injustice already.
