Joe Scott 3: The Body Politic

Retired Justice O’Connor Speaks Out

15 March 2006 |permalink | email article

Thanks to rawstory.com, a transcript of NPR News legal affairs correspondent Nina Totenberg’s coverage of Sandra Day OíConnorís tough and news worthy speech at Georgetown University last week became available. While not broadcast, it was ignored by the Washington media establishment.

Totenberg described the opinionated remarks by the retired Supreme Court justice as forceful, noting that attacks on the judiciary by some Republican leaders pose a direct threat to our constitutional freedoms.

OíConnor began by conceding that courts do have the powers to make presidents or the Congress or governors, as she put it, ìreally, really angry.î But she continued, if we donít make them mad some of the time we probably arenít doing our job as judges.

She said the nationís founders wrote repeatedly that without an independent judiciary to protect individual rights from other branches of government those rights and privileges would mean nothing.

Taking aim at former House GOP leader Tom DeLay without naming him, she quoted his attacks on the courts at a meeting of the conservative Christian group Justice Sunday last year when he took after the courts for rulings on abortions, prayers and the Terri Schiavo case.

Worse still, OíConnor noted death threats against judges are increasing. It doesnít help, she said, when a high-profile senator suggests there may be a connection between violence against judges and the decisions the senator disagrees with. She didnít name the senator but Totenberg said it was Texas senator John Cornyn.

OíConnor said she is against judicial reforms driven by naked partisan reasoning, pointing to the experiences of developing countries and former communist countries where interference with an independent judiciary has allowed dictatorship to flourish.

The Arizona Republican, long a swing vote on the Supreme Court, said it takes a lot of degeneration before a country falls into dictatorship but we should avoid those ends by avoiding those beginnings.

During his State of the Union address W. took note of the presence in the House chamber of newly sworn Justice Samuel Alito. He also paid tribute to the retired OíConnor. I then expected the camera to zoom in on the gallery. But, tellingly, she was not observed.

Iraq: The Long Goodbye

14 March 2006 |permalink | email article

With Iraq on the precipice of civil war, an optimistic President Bush blindly continues to insist to the chorus that ìwe have a comprehensive strategy for victory.î But two-thirds of Americans disagree and the refrain from his conservative allies grows significantly more muted.

The president joked at the Gridiron dinner: ìYou know there are all these conspiracy theories that Dick runs the country, or Karl runs the country. Why arenít there any conspiracy theories that I run the country?î Well, whatever the truth the buck stops with the commander-in-chief. But he is in such denial of reality that unless Iraq stabilizes within months his legacy in history will be sealed.

I mean, hereís a president who three years ago this coming Monday unilaterally attacked Iraq to make the U.S. safer without any viable strategic post-war plan, and now is suddenly sounding the alarm against isolation and making the case for international cooperation. Goodbye, Freedom fries. Hello, French fries!

The real story is how prominent conservatives have turned on W. The columnist George Will pointed out that Iraq, Iran and North Korea are ìmore dangerous than they were.î Blogger Andrew Sullivan said, ìWe have learned a tough lesson.î

William F. Buckley, Jr., the conservative high priest, said Bush has ìa very difficult internal problem here because the kind of concession that is strategically appropriate requires a mitigation of policies he has several times affirmed in high-blown pronouncements ñ the kernel here is the acknowledgement of defeat.î

The most significant defection and powerful indictment of the war on Iraq and the role of neoconservatives ideas in shaping that decision ñ in terms of implementation and its aftermath ñ is a new book, “America at the Crosroads,” by Francis Fukuyama, - a provacative must read. It shatters any doubts about W.ís mishandling of this catastrophe.

Fukuyama, whose best-selling 1992 book, ìThe End of History and the Last Man,î was a classic neo-conservative text on the end of the cold war and the global march of liberal democracy. A star neoconservative himself, Fukuyama studied with or was associated with such leading neoconservative luminaries as Paul D. Wolfowitz and William Kristol. 

Beginning in 1998 he urged President Clinton to take a harder line on Iraq and after 9/11 called for a determined effort to remove Saddam Hussein from power. Two years later, in a Washington Post op-ed article, he began to voice concerns ìabout how the reaction to 9/11 will lead to a world in which U.S. policy and its policies remain the chief focus of global concern.î

Fukuyama wrote a blistering critique of the neoconservative push for war that was published in The National Interest in the summer of 2004 which summarizes many of the arguments detailed in the explosive book which Michiko Kakutani reviewed in The New York Times on March 14. He writes, ìneoconservativism, as a political symbol and a body of thought, has evolved into something that I can no longer support.î

W. Loses His Groove

09 March 2006 |permalink | email article

The Financial Timesí headline said it all about the collapse of the Dubai Ports World deal: ìArab Ally Senses Bush No Longer in Control in Washington.î The president may not be a lame duck yet but Congress has asserted itself; Republicans are no longer rubber-stamps; and Democrats get a midterm boost.

My previous posts - (2.19); (2.22); (2.26); and (2.28) ñ made the point that, aside from the firestorm over the pre-9/11 connection the United Arab Emirates had with Osama bin Ladin, the real national security issue involves container inspection. Foreign companies manage most of the terminals at American ports, and foreign governments control some. The Dubai fiasco, still unravelling, is another case of a tired administration and president asleep at the switch.

The two busiest ports in terms of cargo value in the billions ñ Los Angeles and Long Beach ñ lease space to foreign operators. At the former,  China, Japan, Taiwan, Singapore and Denmark; Japan, South Korea and Hong Kong at the latter.

Itís absurd to assert that inspection of containers by the Coast Guard and U.S. Customs and Border Protection is really effective regardless of who operates the terminals. The reality is that the level of inspection is no more than 5% and, in the case of the Department of Homeland Security, reportedly about 1%.

In foreign ports, there is little sophisticated surveillance of container cargo headed for U.S. ports which could contain weapons of mass destruction. DHS spent about $1.6 billion on port security in FY 2005.

As with U.S. troops, proper protection at the ports matters. Consider that as the U.S. begins its fourth year in Iraq, the annual cost of military spending is growing. Monthly expenditures there are running at $5.9 billion. The U.S. commitment in Afghanistan ñ now zooming out of control - is about $1 billion.

The major domestic issue in the midterm elections must be to divert some of those billions into real homeland security at the ports. While nervous Republicans are jumping into lifeboats and rowing away from a sinking W., fumbling Democrats should seize the moment - and the issue.