Oh, Stop Screaming - the Pain's Not "Severe"

Disclaimer: I am not a lawyer. But I don't believe you have to be an expert in Constitutional Law to understand what "cruel and unusual" means and to see the logical consequences of judicially approving the infliction of pain.

Today's Supreme Court decision upholding Kentucky's lethal-injection death penalty does far more than put state executions back on track.

It confirms the idea that there's an acceptable level of pain that American officials can inflict on prisoners without fear of violating Constitutional principles.

This is a philosophy of justification that owes far more to Abu Graib than to Madison and Hamilton.

Patriotic Americans still hoping to establish through the courts that the torture and denial of habeas corpus practiced at Guantanamo are un-Constitutional depravities unbecoming a Democracy should despair at this decision.

Seven of the nine Supreme Court Justices have just announced that American officials inflicting on prisoners pain that falls just short of "severe" is perfectly fine with them.

That Roberts, Alito, Scalia and Thomas align themselves with the evil depravity of Smirky-Darth is no surprise, but for Kennedy to join them is a disappointment. And the concurrence of Breyer and say-it-ain't-so! John Paul Stephens is devastating. Only Ginsberg and Souter dared to defy the torture-loving perverts among their Brethren.

I'm not saying that lethal injection constitutes torture. I'm saying that when the Supreme Court starts pronouncing on levels of acceptable pain, their justification of torture can't be far down the road.

Cross-posted at BlueGrassRoots.

There's more: "Oh, Stop Screaming - the Pain's Not "Severe"" >>

At the End of the Day

No, no I didn't skip a day. You just got sucked through a black hole and your sense of time & space have been totally hosed.

• Oh, yeah, this outta end well.

To ease an application backlog, the federal government plans to issue green cards to about 47,000 immigrants before the FBI finishes a complete background check...

• Antonin Scalia, strict constitutional constructionist, and all 'round douchebag.

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia rejected the notion that US courts have any control over the actions of American troops at Guantanamo Bay, argued that torture of terror detainees is not banned under the US Constitution and insisted that the high court has no obligation to act as a moral beacon for other nations.

• Hey, Glenn, save a little somethin' for after the primaries.

Democrats should be eager -- not afraid -- to have the 2008 election turn on a referendum on whether Americans want to continue paying for the indefinite occupation of Iraq, and more so, whether we will start new Americans wars -- i.e., whether they want to have the same neoconservative extremists who got us into Iraq continue to dominate America's foreign policy, as they will under President McCain. McCain's supposed great strong suit is actually his greatest vulnerability, if Democrats are willing to make that case.

• These kids today, why don't they care about politics?

Sarah Boltuck's senior year at Walt Whitman High School in Bethesda was transformed by a rejection letter -- not from a college, but from the Montgomery County Board of Elections.

It said she could not vote in the February primary because she was not yet 18. Boltuck thought differently. She fought it all the way to the state elections board and the attorney general's office, and she won.

Boltuck and her friends at Whitman are part of an age bracket unusually energized this election cycle, particularly in support of Boltuck's candidate, Democrat Barack Obama.

There's more: "At the End of the Day" >>

It's about the Judiciary, Stupid!

Tomorrow, citizens in 24 states will go to the polls to select the candidate that will be our standard bearer in the general election in November.

The Republican nomination, based as it is on their oh-so-Republican "winner take all" delegate allocations might be sewn up tomorrow. But the Democrats, being, well, Democratic and awarding delegates proportionally, will probably have to battle on for another month or so.

For me, this election distills to one solitary issue...judicial appointments.

Appointments to the Federal bench are for a lifetime. And those lifetime-tenured appointments are the real source of power over the lives of ordinary Americans. They can make decisions that affect your ability to seek recompense in the face of negligence. They can interpret laws in such a manner that your fundamental rights and the relationship between citizens and their government are fundamentally altered.

Who sits on the Federal bench is the ongoing legacy of every president, Democrat or Republican.
With Judicial appointments in the forefront, the Alliance for Justice Action Campaign has assembled a voter handbook, and spells out five questions informed voters should not merely ask, but demand cogent answers to.

1. What criteria would you use to select a Supreme Court Justice?
2. What is the best Supreme Court decision in recent history? The worst?
3. Who do you have in mind as a potential Supreme Court nominee?
4. Which Supreme Court Justice would be your role model when you are appointing a nominee? Why?
5. How can Americans make their voices heard in the White House and in the Senate to influence the judicial nomination process.
   

Keep that in mind when you go to the polls tomorrow, and in November.

[That's all, folks...]

There's more: "It's about the Judiciary, Stupid!" >>