Keith Olbermann, who moved from ESPN to MSNBC, from sports to news, is telling things like they truly are. Sadly, when someone sent him some harmless powder, with a warning that he stop his criticism of the Bush Administration, the New York Post thought it was funny. IN fact, when Olbermann asked for additional tests at the hospital to see if powder was indeed harmless soap powder, as preliminary tests indicated, the Post's Richard Johnson mockingly wrote "[w]hether they gave him a lollipop on the way out isn't known."
I was afraid he'd back off, but he hasn't. Here is a link to his latest comment on the Military Commissions Act, which Bush signed this week. A few excerpts if you don't have time to read the whole comment...
"This President now has his blank check.
He lied to get it.
He lied as he received it.
Is there any reason to even hope, he has not lied about how he intends to use it, nor who he intends to use it against?
"These military commissions will provide a fair trial," you told us yesterday, Mr. Bush. "In which the accused are presumed innocent, have access to an attorney, and can hear all the evidence against them."
'Presumed innocent,' Mr. Bush?
The very piece of paper you signed as you said that, allows for the detainees to be abused up to the point just before they sustain "serious mental and physical trauma" in the hope of getting them to incriminate themselves, and may no longer even invoke The Geneva Conventions in their own defense.
'Access to an attorney,' Mr. Bush?
Lieutenant Commander Charles Swift said on this program, Sir, and to the Supreme Court, that he was only granted access to his detainee defendant, on the promise that the detainee would plead guilty.
'Hearing all the evidence,' Mr. Bush?
The Military Commissions act specifically permits the introduction of classified evidence not made available to the defense.
Your words are lies, Sir. They are lies, that imperil us all.
"One of the terrorists believed to have planned the 9/11 attacks," …you told us yesterday… "said he hoped the attacks would be the beginning of the end of America."
That terrorist, sir, could only hope.
Not his actions, nor the actions of a ceaseless line of terrorists (real or imagined), could measure up to what you have wrought.
Habeas Corpus? Gone.
The Geneva Conventions? Optional.
The Moral Force we shined outwards to the world as an eternal beacon, and inwards at ourselves as an eternal protection? Snuffed out.
These things you have done, Mr. Bush… they would be "the beginning of the end of America.""
Sadly, since the MCA provides the president with the authority to decide who is an "enemy combatant" and precludes even habeas review for U.S. citizens classified this way, the next warning Olbermann receives could be a trip to Gitmo.
Seriously.
The MCA allows even a U.S. citizen to be classified as an "unlawful enemy combatant" if they "purposefully and materially support[] hostilities against the United States."
It's not a stretch to conclude that an administration which reads the Constitution to allow the "unitary chief executive" to disobey both U.S. law and disregard the Constitution in times of "war" would also read this act to include prosecution of people like Olbermann.
Or you. Or me.
Is it?
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