¡Si, Se Puede!

Another year, another May Day. Or perhaps not. Given the excitement over immigration reform, demonstrations took place in numerous cities across the US over the course of yesterday. As with the demonstrations last month in opposition to the immigration reform act sponsored by Congressman F. James Sensenbrenner (R-WI), the chant of "¡Si, Se Puede!" seemed to be ubiquitous. Would it kill people to sing some Zeppelin? Hello? "Immigrant Song" anyone?

You're not in a civil war until we say so

Wow. Talk about balls. This from former Iraqi Prime Minister Ayad Allawi on the third anniversary of the invasion of Iraq:

We are losing each day as an average 50 to 60 people throughout the country, if not more. If this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is.

Now compare that with Vice President Dick Cheney's thoughts:

I think the assessment that we get from Gen. George Casey, who's our man commanding in Iraq, from Zal Khalilzad, the ambassador, from John Abizaid, who is the general in charge of Central Command, doesn't square with that.

To summarize: one man's civil war is another man's "sectarian violence." By that logic, would the senior leadership of the Bush administration be willing to revise our understaning of the American Civil War as merely sectarian violence? Just a thought.

Damn you, NBC!

Stupid NBC. I don't know why, but this year, I got sucked into NBC's hype machine. All last week, I had settled into the comfortable routine of coming home from lab and tuning in to whatever Olympic event was playing as I would sit down for dinner. Now that the 2006 Winter Olympics are over, I feel like I'm going through some kind of withdrawal. Oh well, at least there's the Oscars to look forward to next weekend. At least I won't have to get up at 7 am on a Sunday. Gah. I did that this morning for the Finland-Sweeden gold medal game. Henrik Lundqvist rocks. Here's to hoping he continues his stellar play when the NHL sesason resumes this week.

Lazy Saturday

It's been about two months since I've arrived in San Antonio and this is probaby the coldest weekend so far. According to the announcer for KSTX, one of the local NPR affiliates, at 3:30 pm the temperature was "... a very cold 37 degrees Fahrenheit." Sweet! All these 80 degree "winter" days are totally messing with my head.

It's all fun and games until someone loses an eye

Oh wait. It's not fun and games until someone gets shot in the eye. This one courtesy of Vice President Cheney who, um, accidentally shot his fellow hunter over the weekend and apparently hoped that no one would find out.

A backbone grows in the Senate

Just when I thought I'd have to revise my understanding of checks and balances as outlined in the Consitution, the Senate comes along to restore my faith in the Constitution.

A little disclaimer to put things into context. As we make our way through middle and high school, we learned in civics class that our government was divided into three branches: the legislative, executive, and judicial branches. Funny. Given the recent string of events (Judge Alito's confirmation hearing, the controversy over telephone wiretapping of questionable legality by the NSA), I was beginning to think that we had, in fact, not three but two branches of government: the executive branch; the rubber-stamping extension of the executive branch (aka the judicial branch); and the legislative extension of the executive branch (aka the legislative branch). How do we end up with two branches? Count the executive branch as an integral branch and count the judicial and legislative branches as a half-branch each.

Now, in the wake of the New York Times' recent investigative piece of the NSA's questionably legal wiretapping of domestic phonecalls, the Senate Judiciary Committee hauled in Attorney General Alberto Gonzales for some "quality time," this past Monday. Some highlights:

Senator Arlen Spector (R-PA): When... members of Congress heard about your intention that the resolution authorizing the use of force amended the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, there was general shock.

Attorney General Gonzales: This is not a situation where FISA has been overridden or FISA has been amended. That's never been our position.

Senator Spector: Well, that just defies logic and plain English. FISA says squarely that you can't have electronic surveillance without a warrant. And you are saying that those words in FISA are no longer applicable.

(For those keeping score at home, a warrant is required from the FISA court to conduct wiretapping. FISA even allows warrants to be issued retroactively for up to seventytwo hours; that is, a wiretap can be in progress for up to three days while the warrant is being requested. And it almost always is. Which begs the question: rather than insist that warrantless wiretaps are legal, why the hell doesn't the Bush administration just simply request Congress to amend FISA? More on that in a bit.)

(But first, let's see what happens when we substitute the coffee normally used in the Senate with Folger's Checks-and-Balances brand coffee...)

Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC): Do you believe it's lawful for the Congress to tell the military that you cannot physically abuse a prisoner of war?

Attorney General Gonzales: I'm not prepared to say that, Senator... I think that you can make an argument that that's part of the rule -

Senator Graham (interrupting): Mr. Attorney General, if we can't do that, if we can't, during a time of war, regulate the behavior of our troops, then really, we have no power in a time of war.

(Oooh! Burn! Senate: 1. Executive branch: 0.)

(But back my question about why the Bush administration won't request Congress to amend FISA...)

Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT): (indignant about the Bush administration's assertation that further amendments to FISA by the Senate Judiciary Committee was unnecessary to conduct warrantless wiretapping) And now you tell us that the committee that has to write the law never was asked? Does this sound like a CYA ["cover your ass"?] on your part? It does to me.

Attorney General Gonzales: We had discussions with the bipartisan leadership of the Congress about this program.

Senator Leahy: But not in front of this committee. We have both Republicans and Democrats on this committee, you know.

Attorney General Gonzales: Yes, sir, I do know that -

Senator Leahy (interrupting): And this committee has given you five amendments to FISA, because you requested it. Heavens! Thank God we have a press that [at] least tells us what the heck you guys are doing.

(Hmm. That didn't answer the question but it's always fun to see representatives of the current Executive Branch get tonguelashed in public. I only wish the Supreme Court had given the Bush administration lawyers this much of a hard time a couple of years ago during the arguments for Hamdi v. Rumsfeld and Rumsfeld v. Padilla.)

(And speaking of tonguelashings, the best was yet to come. Senator Russ Feingold of Wisconsin opened up a can of whoop-ass on Attorney General Gonzales, issuing a thinly veiled accusation that Gonzales lied about his position on wiretapping during his confirmation hearing in order to be confirmed as Attorney General.)

Senator Russell Feingold (D-WI): If you had told the truth, maybe that would have jeopardized your nomination. You wanted to be confirmed. So you let a misleading statement about one of the central issues of your confirmation, your view of executive power, stay on the record until the New York Times revealed the program.

Attorney General Gonzales: Senator, I have told the truth then. I'm telling the truth now. You asked about a hypothetical situation of the President of the United States authorizing electronic surveillance in violation of our criminal statutes. That has not occurred.

(Just a quick comment before we get back to the action... Huh?! Does the Attorney General not understand that a warrant must be issued by the FISA court? And that warrants can be requested retroactively? Whatever the Attorney General is smoking, get me some of that too.)

Senator Feingold: Mister Chairman, I think the witness has taken mincing words to a new high. [There's] no question in my mind, that when you answered the question that was a hypothetical, you knew it was not a hypothetical, and you were under oath at the time.

(Ouch!)

At the end all this, Attorney General Gonzales politely said that he would take suggestions from the Judiciary Committee members but gave no indication that the Bush administration would seek Congressional approval on, well, whatever the hell the Executive Branch feels like doing.

In summary, as gratifying as it was to see the Senate exhibiting some semblance of a backbone, the Executive Branch still got away with a "Fuck you very much." Damn.

Saddam gets cranky

This just in from CNN.com...

As court was adjourning for the day in his trial, Saddam Hussein suddenly shouted that he would not attend Wednesday's session. "I will not be in a court without justice. Go to hell, all you agents of America," he said. He also complained that he had been wearing the same shirt and underwear for three days.

Um, that's a little bit too much information. And what was that thing about him doing his laundry in the presence of his guards in the immediate days following his capture? Has he suddenly forgotten how to wash clothes?