For the non-lawyers in the audience, the sum and substance of this opinion is that the thugs in Congress who wrote the Torture Act and their masters in the White House have won, and won big, today. They managed to succeed in negating the power of the federal courts to consider habeas corpus applications, while still persuading the same federal courts they had not "suspended" the writ.
Little difference, that, since a right (to habeas corpus) without the ability to seek a remedy (no power in any court to consider habeas) isn't much of a right at all.
How does Senator Specter, who voted for the Torture Act while being convinced it was both unconstitutional and would be tossed by the Courts, feel now that he has been proven wrong on both counts?
How does Senator McCain, who suffered so long and deeply at the hands of North Vietnamese torturers feel, since he has imported those same inhumanities to his beloved homeland?
I'd ask how Senator Tortureman, CFL-CT, feels, but I suppose he's getting wood over this, and the possibility that South Dakota's one Democratic senator is reported to have suffered a stroke this afternoon, and that a Repug governor in that state would result in a Repug controlled Senate, should the worst play out there.
I'd say a lot more, but it'd probably set off the profanity filters. Suffice it to say, Judge Robertson does not, IMHO, deserve his office. Not that his office matters much, anymore.
