David Corn wrote this post yesterday about Bush's proclamation (as if we didnt' know it) that he is not a lawyer. Bush said:

I'm not a lawyer, but I can tell you what it means. It means Congress gave me the authority to use necessary force to protect the American people, but it didn't prescribe the tactics. It's an--you've got the power to protect us, but we're not going to tell you how. And one of the ways to protect the American people is to understand the intentions of the enemy. I told you it's a different kind of war with a different kind of enemy. If they're making phone calls into the United States, we need to know why -- to protect you.

Our Army is stretched past capacity. I'd like to think that this is just a numbers-crunching problem for Iraq.

But the way Bush is going, Iran and North Korea are also on the radar. What if troops are needed in those locations as well?

How will they do it without a draft? For those 21 - 25 year-olds who read TalkLet, I'm curious, would you go?

When it comes to the TL kid, I would say, "'over my dead body you'll take him." The greatest horror show I can remember was back in 1970 when there was a draft lottery to decide who would have to go into the service and presumably to Vietnam. The night of the lottery, I watched tv in Ann Arbor, MI with my male friends, who like me, had just taken our LSAT's and were planning on going to law school. I'll never forget the looks on the faces of those who were dealt early numbers. They just walked out of the room, when their numbers were called. And they didn't come back.

Now, as a parent of a kid in law school, who also is opposed to Bush and to war, I can't even imagine him in that situation. If it happens, I bet I won't be the only parent who says, "Hell, No, We Wont' Go." We'll play Arlo Guthrie's song, Alices Restaurant and find another place to live.

Great catch by Think Progress.

Over the weekend, Time magazine and the Washingtonian both reported on five photos of President Bush with Jack Abramoff, but neither publication revealed its source.

Yesterday, ThinkProgress laid out the case for why the source for the photos was likely Abramoff himself. Last night, our hunch was confirmed.

Appearing on MSNBC, Newsweek correspondent Michael Isikoff reported that it was indeed Abramoff who floated the photographs to Washingtonian.

Watch the video.

Thanks to Glenn Greenwald for pointing out that in 2002, Republican Mike DeWine proposed amending FISA to reduce the probable cause standard for foreigners to one of "reasonable suspicion" and his bill was defeated.

There was good reason for rejecting DeWine's bill. It's called the Fourth Amendment. From an AP article on June 26, 2002 (available on Lexis):

Stephen Saltzburg, a George Washington University law professor, questioned whether courts would view DeWine's proposal as violating Fourth Amendment protections against unreasonable searches.

"Any departure from probable cause when dealing with electronic surveillance warrants will be dealt with extreme skepticism by the judiciary," he said.

The ACLU noted:

....the lower standard would make it too easy for the FBI "to break into a non-citizen's home, download everything in his computer and rifle through everything in his bedroom."

Is the military gearing up to execute prisoners? The BBC reports it has changed it's rules on implementing death sentences. There are six prisoners currently on death row after courts-martial proceedings.

One of the changes pertains to where executions take place. Previoiusly, the rules specified Ft. Leavenworth, KS as the place of execution.

The revision also makes it possible for executions to take place at any military prison, not just Fort Leavenworth. This, according to anti-death penalty protesters, means it would be technically legal for executions to take place at Guantanamo Bay.

[Via Raw Story.]

Not surprisingly, the Senate Judiciary Committee passed Judge Sam Alito on for a vote in the full Senate. All Democrats voted against him.The make-up of the Committee, with 10 Republicans and 8 Democratics assured this would be the outcome. Here are excerpts from the hearing this morning at which the vote was taken. The full transcript (html) is here.

Will it be any different in the full Senate? Raw Story reports today that Florida Senator, Democrat Bill Nelson announced he will vote against Alito.

The Council of Europe's interim report on U.S. secret prisons in Europe is out. The report says there is evidence that the U.S. outsourced torture and European Governments likely were aware of it.

"There is a great deal of coherent, convergent evidence pointing to the existence of a system of "relocation" or "outsourcing" of torture," Marty said in the report to the Council of Europe, the human rights watchdog on whose behalf he is investigating.

"Acts of torture or severe violation of detainees' dignity through the administration of inhuman or degrading treatment are carried outside national territory and beyond the authority of national intelligence services," Marty said. He added that more than 100 suspects may have been transferred to countries where they faced torture or ill treatment in recent years.

Thanks to those who have noticed that there has been a paucity of advertising on TalkLeft since News Years and put a few dollars in the tip jar. They really help me out and are very appreciated.

Here's the link to TalkLeft's tip jar, if anyone else is so inclined.

Criminal defense lawyer Terry Kindlon (a frequent reader and commenter on TalkLeft) has filed what is believed to be the first motion to dismiss criminal charges against his client due to Bush's warrantless NSA electronic monitoring program.

An FBI sting case that targeted two members of an Albany mosque should be dismissed because the investigation originated from a national spying program that may be illegal, an attorney for one of the defendants said in a motion filed in U.S. District Court. The challenge of the government's case against Yassin Aref and Mohammed Hossain, who are accused of taking part in a plot to sell missile launchers to terrorists, may force federal prosecutors, and a U.S. District judge, to address a national debate unfolding about whether the National Security Agency violated any laws by eavesdropping on U.S. residents.

Terence L. Kindlon, Aref's attorney, filed a nine-page motion late Friday asking for all evidence in the case to be thrown out, and for a dismissal of the indictment. While defense lawyers in the case have been requesting access to classified evidence for more than a year, the new motion specifically targets the NSA program.

....Now, with attorneys for Aref and Hossain confident secret surveillance was the catalyst for the FBI's Albany sting, the stage is set for the NSA program to be challenged on constitutional grounds as part of the local case. The question is whether the government will be compelled, even tacitly, to confirm that Aref was targeted because of information gleaned from the controversial spy program.

It's time for the Tuesday Open Thread. Some things of interest:

• Jane of Firedoglake, Taylor Marsh and Matt Stoller (who often writes at MyDD) have created a blog for comments on Washington Post articles.

• Arianna writes that Hillary is not a lock for the '08 nomination

• Alternet also has a new blog, The Echo Chamber, that will cover how political ideas and issues are communicated and gain traction in the media universe. It aims to spread the word of the progressive community far and wide.

U.S. District Court Judge Jed Rakoff, one of my favorites (for many reasons, including this one) has ordered the Pentagon to release the names of the Guantanamo detainees.

U.S. District Judge Jed S. Rakoff told the government to provide the information in the form of unredacted copies of transcripts and documents related to 558 military hearings in which detainees were permitted to challenge their incarcerations.

AP attorney David A. Schulz said he expected the government to appeal. "The judge has rejected the Defense Department's effort to use the privacy interests of detainees to prevent the public from learning information about the actions taken at Guantanamo Bay," he said.

Bump and Update: (TL) Unbelievable. Chief Warrant Officer Lewis Welshofer, Jr. convicted of manslaughter for killing an Iraq military officer during an interrogation is sentenced to no jail and a reprimand. Soldiers in the courtroom cheered at the sentence. How disgusting, there simply is no other word for it.

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Original Post (Jan 22):

by TChris

In a series of posts (collected here), TalkLeft has followed the military's response to the death of Iraqi military officer Abed Hamed Mowhoush during an abusive interrogation. The trial is over and the verdict is in: