Comments on: al-Haramain Reply Filed; Constitution & Rule Of Law In Judge Vaughn Walker’s Hands

By: bobschacht

bobschacht — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 21:14:51 +0000

It is simply astonishing that people can still believe this is some grand eleventy dimensional chess feint. It is not; this IS their position and they are fighting like dogs for it.

bmaz,
I meant to try another take on this with you in our all-too-brief meeting last night:

Obama is not known as a chess player, but his basketball skills are evident.
There’s a big difference: In chess, as in court, you play to the end-game: the game ends with “Check mate,” or with “The court finds that…”

Basketball, and politics, are different. A basketball game has 4 quarters. The game isn’t over until the clock runs out. And when the clock runs out, the game ends, no matter who scored the most points in the last minutes of the game. You could score the last 20 points in the game, but if you fall 2 points short in the game total, you lose.

As I see it, we’re nearing the end of the first quarter. My bet is that Obama had a game plan for the first quarter, and his staff is evaluating that game plan in the light of events that have taken place. I think that evaluation will continue until the end of the year. Some aspects of that game plan worked, others didn’t.

I think the second quarter will have a different game plan, which we will find out about mainly in his SOTU speech next January.

Any basketball team wants to be ahead at the end of each quarter. But the main goal is to be ahead at the end of the game.

I think that this is a very different way of operating than the Bush WH. Their idea seemed to be that you got all your points (political capital) at the beginning of the game, and again after the first half (mid-term elections), and that the thing to do was to “spend” your political capital. Their game model was more like poker?

Bob now in AZ

By: oldtree

oldtree — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 14:18:43 +0000

Holmes, Thurgood, even Madison, would watch and wonder at how the system they helped create has become the only refuge of the people for justice as the other branches ignore their oath of office and continue to commit crimes not only against the people of our country, but against humanity.
It is a wonderful thing to know that there are some judges that rule by the law. There are some of you judges out there following this too, watching your country, watching your profession in times likely to “try men’s souls”.
thanks Bmaz and to the Wheel. You are going to be remembered as long as there is democracy. You take on the government for the sake of the people’s right to know. Not a client, not a requirement to defend. The very existence of the concept we hold dear, and are in danger of watching fly from the cage that some will wish to keep closed, forever.

By: bmaz

bmaz — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 05:37:58 +0000

Tee hee hee; I am nothing if not predictable….

By: Hmmm

Hmmm — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 05:29:28 +0000

Actually not, but now that you mention it, I shoulda thought of that…

By: bmaz

bmaz — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 04:13:30 +0000

Heh heh; you were baiting me weren’t you??

By: Stephen

Stephen — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 03:31:17 +0000

Wouldn’t it be great to find out that the Spanish believe they have a slam dunk case against Darth and his evil sorcerers because of all the Emptywheel research handed to them on the net?

By: Hmmm

Hmmm — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 03:18:33 +0000

Material witness.

By: booyah

booyah — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 03:06:10 +0000

ps… as an aside Emptywheel…. I just read about al Kidd’s victory of sorts in Idaho… the 3 judge Fed Court ruled that Ashcroft could be personally held responsible for them holding al Kidd for 2 weeks in 2005 for no reason (can’t remember the technical terms the bastards used to fuck up his entire life…) He is a US Citizen…

Anyway, seems to be a big case victory…. all three judges were either Bush or Reagan appointees.

By: Hmmm

Hmmm — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 02:58:07 +0000

Just a hypothetical, counselor. Just a hypothetical.

By: bmaz

bmaz — Wed, 09 Sep 2009 01:39:09 +0000

Absolutely and unequivocally not. The thought that Obama “wants to see this case lost” is laughable on its face. he has fought for the right to assert the state secrets privilege in every venue and case possible and has fought hard and filed repeated declarations in support thereof; including in Jeppesen where the 9th Circuit literally called him out and chastised him for it. It is simply astonishing that people can still believe this is some grand eleventy dimensional chess feint. It is not; this IS their position and they are fighting like dogs for it.