I agree with every word of this Glenn Greenwald piece. I have nothing to add to it except to say I wish I had written it.

This is an Open Thread.

In an editorial today, The New York Times writes:

We can understand that Americans may be eager to put these dark chapters behind them, but it would be irresponsible for the nation and a new administration to ignore what has happened — and may still be happening in secret C.I.A. prisons that are not covered by the military’s current ban on activities like waterboarding. A prosecutor should be appointed to consider criminal charges against top officials at the Pentagon and others involved in planning the abuse.

I agree. But I find the Times' reticence to include top officials in the White House surprising and wrong. As Vice President Cheney has made clear, these decisions went all the way to the top - to the President of the United States. A Special Prosecutor should be empowered to investigate the criminal actions of the President and Vice President as well.

Speaking for me only

If a unanimous verdict is required to convict, it is sensible to think that a unanimous verdict should be required to impose a death sentence. Sensible thought has eluded Georgia's conservative politicians who (as Jeralyn noted here) have declared war on the unanimity requirement because only nine jurors voted to kill Brian Nichols.

Now, just days after the decision, Georgia legislators have begun lining up to introduce bills eliminating the requirement that juries be unanimous for a death sentence. Hard-on-crime lawmakers have long favored easier rules on death sentencing, but the Nichols sentence has given new urgency to their cause.

The argument that some "death qualified" jurors are secretly opposed to the death penalty in all circumstances would be easier to swallow if only one juror dissented from death. When a quarter of the jurors think the case for death hasn't been made, only those overcome by blood lust could believe the defendant should be executed. [more ...]

While conceding that she had no reason to believe the City of Boston had acted improperly, Judge Nancy Gertner (among the best and brightest of the federal district court judges) wondered aloud whether plans to deport Ulysses Rodriguez Charles to Trinidad in the near future were "somehow related" to his lawsuit against the Boston Police Department for his wrongful conviction. The lawsuit is scheduled to go to trial in April but immigration authorities seem determined to spirit Charles out of the country before he has a chance to see a jury.

The City's lawyer worked up a show of indignation "that Gertner disparaged his client by voicing 'wholly unfounded suspicions' that federal immigration authorities might have colluded with the city to try to deport Charles before his trial." The lawyer, John Roache, asked Gertner to recuse herself. Gertner declined after reminding the lawyer of her repeated statements that she had no reason to suspect collusion. Her comments instead raised a legitimate question about the timing of the federal government's deportation decision in light of her request to delay deportation so that Charles could have his day in court.

[more ...]

Not much news to report this evening. It's all Blagojevich, Caroline and stories we've been talking about for days. The Illinois Supreme Court won't remove the Governor; Caroline toured upstate NY.

Chrysler has shut down production of cars for a month; Bernie Madoff got better bond conditions today with a condition of home detention -- at night only; Attorney General Mukasey recused himself from Madoff's case because his son, a lawyer with Bracewell and Giuliani (yes that Giuliani) is representing a Madoff exec; and Madoff's wife Ruth may be under investigation.

Former Soprano's actor Lillo Brancato's jury is deliberating his fate on felony murder charges -- they asked to review evidence this afternoon; Georgia legislators push to eliminate the jury unanimity requirement in death penalty cases.

Obama has picked Pastor Rick Warren to deliver the invocation at his inauguration.

If there's something you'd like to talk about, here's a place.

Responding specifically to Kevin Drum and to those, like me that share the "widely held view" Kevin espoused about the need to addresss income inequality for sustained economic growth, Krugman writes:

This is a widely held view, and I’m as much in favor of a strong middle class as anyone. Nonetheless, I’d say that in terms of strict economics it’s wrong. There’s no obvious reason why consumer demand can’t be sustained by the spending of the upper class — $200 dinners and luxury hotels create jobs, the same way that fast food dinners and Motel 6s do.

Krugman cites NYC as an example. Far be it from me to disagree with a Nobel prize winning economist, but this seems antihistorical to me. Mature economies have depended upon a large middle class. NYC in particular has a large middle class outside of Mahattan (even larger if one consider the entire metropolitan region.) In any event, this gives me a research project on economic history and I will try and see if I can disprove Krugman's argument.

Speaking for me only

Maricopa County (Phoenix, AZ) Sheriff Joe Arpaio, who instituted such ridiculous shaming punishments as forcing male inmates to wear pink underwear, making juveniles serve on chain gangs and bury the dead, and requiring inmates to sleep in tents, and who is the subject of a class action suit by the ACLU for racial profiling of latinos in an effort to enforce federal immigration laws, is being given his own tv show on the Fox Reality Channel.

The show is called "Smile, You're Under Arrest". [More...]

Does it really take an investigation to answer the big question here?

The Securities and Exchange Commission said Tuesday night that it had missed repeated opportunities to discover what may be the largest financial fraud in history, a Ponzi scheme whose losses could run as high as $50 billion. The commission said it received credible allegations about the scheme at least nine years ago and will immediately open an internal investigation to examine why it had failed to pursue them aggressively.

SEC Chair Christopher Cox is astonished to learn that the commission failed to respond aggressively to allegations of Wall Street executive Bernard Madoff's "financial wrongdoing." He shouldn't be. The regulatory philosophy of the Bush administration (regulators should be helpful, not adversarial, in their oversight of the regulated industry) has always been an excuse for lax enforcement -- and it's a philosophy Cox embraced. That's why President Bush gave him his job.

[more ...]

Responding to Reuel Marc Gerecht's defense of his pro-torture position, Kevin Drum writes:

Sadly, I suspect that Gerecht is right: if torture had been put to a vote back in 2001, it would have passed. The language would have been prettied up, of course, but the intention would have been clear enough and the public would have approved. Even today, I'm pretty sure that a majority of Americans are basically OK with torture as long as it's mostly kept out of sight and they can go about their business.

Drum begs the question - since no such vote took place, torture remained illegal. And of course, if an open vote was held - torture could not have been "kept out of sight." The United States would have had to opt out of the UN Convention on Torture and repeal its codification of the Convention. Would we as a people have approved of this when forced to say "we approve of torture?" I do not know, but the illegality, indeed, the criminality, of what occurred remains manifest. In our names. The stain will never be removed.

Speaking for me only

lilburro offers us two more diaries on the intelligence community and the Obama Administration. Jacob Freeze questions our silence regarding the wiretapping of two Democratic governors by an unreliable Bush Justice Department.

This is an Open Thread.

Actually, Cheney says "we don't do torture." However, a few questions later he contradicts himself:

KARL: And on KSM (Khalid Sheikh Mohammed), one of those tactics, of course, widely reported was waterboarding. And that seems to be a tactic we no longer use. Even that you think was appropriate?

CHENEY: I do.

In case you are wondering waterboarding has been considered torture for thousands of years. It violates US law. It is a crime. Not just a war crime, but also a violation of US criminal law. Cheney has admitted to committing this crime. In our names. And our Congress knew and did nothing. This stain will not wash out.

Speaking for me only

Kevin Drum takes up an issue I discussed on Monday - "secular stagnation" (Paul Krugman's term) and income inequality. Drum, responds, as I did, to something Krugman wrote:

Bob argues that nothing will, unless the government does it. This is a modern version of the "secular stagnation" view popular in the 1940s (and visible in Keynes himself), which argued that there would be a persistent shortfall of private demand, and that we'd basically need a permanent WPA to support the economy. This view turned out to be wrong for the postwar decades . . .

As I argued in my piece, Drum points out that Krugman is ignoring the different situation we now face in terms of income inequality: