Wire Report

(WIRE/TMB) – If you are going to listen to Washington politicians at all, it is always best to listen to the party that is currently out of power. After each election, it is the job of the losers to try to attack the winners in any way they can. Often, they inadvertently advocate genuine principles of liberty in the process.

During the 8-year nightmare that was the Bush administration, it was the Democrats that stumbled upon these principles in their efforts to regain the throne. It was they who pointed out that the government should not be spying on its own citizens, that the president was assuming un-delegated powers through executive order, and that it was neither morally justified nor prudent to invade a third world nation that had committed no acts of aggression against the United States and lacked any reasonable means to do so. Their hysterical mouthpiece, Keith Olbermann, even went so far as to cite a long-forgotten document, the U.S. Constitution.

Of course, it is now abundantly clear that these arguments were made simply out of expediency. With the Democrats in power, it is now the Republicans’ turn to “fight City Hall,” and they have rolled out their usual rhetoric about small government, free markets, and traditional family values. Moreover, they, too, have rolled out the U.S. Constitution and waived it around in opposition to the Democrats’ plans to “spread the wealth around.”

Let’s take note that the Republicans are now correct in opposing the main tenets of the Democratic agenda, including expansion of government involvement in health care, “Cap and Trade,” and other wealth redistribution schemes. Amidst all of the usual noise coming from Washington and its media pundit class, it is only the Republicans that are making any sense at all.

Unfortunately, this is shaping up to produce familiar results. There is a growing movement for “change” that promises to “throw the bums out” in the next two elections. However, those who are part of this movement do not stop to consider what the Republicans’ true agenda will be once they regain power. As they have for over 100 years now, Americans are dashing to the other side in their perennial political game of “pickle in the middle.” They still haven’t learned that the pickle never wins.

The Republicans are having remarkable success in painting President Obama’s agenda as socialist and their “conservatism” as its antithesis. Most average Americans who identify themselves as conservatives accept this argument. If socialism redistributes wealth through the force of government, then conservatism, being its opposite, must oppose such redistribution of wealth. If socialism means that the economy will be centrally planned by government “experts,” then conservatism, being its opposite, must leave those decisions with private citizens. If socialism results in big government, conservatism, being its opposite, must result in small government. These are the assumptions that inform the political decisions of most conservative American voters.

There is only one problem. None of them are true.

The conservative-liberal dichotomy is as old as politics itself. It was present at the founding of the American republic. However, despite the Republicans’ claim to represent America’s founding principles, America was actually founded upon radically liberal ideas. The secession from the British Empire was in essence a complete rejection of conservatism.

Most Americans today believe that the primary motivation for the American Revolution was a separation from the British government. However, the revolutionaries only acquiesced to the necessity of complete separation as a last resort. Even after Lexington, Concord, and Bunker Hill, the colonists were still making attempts to settle their differences with the British king and remain in the British Empire. The primary objection of the colonists was not the British king being their executive, but the conservative, mercantilist economic system that the British government enforced. The colonists objected to the policies of corporate welfare, protectionist tariffs, a central bank, militarism, and the taxes levied upon them to support these and other aspects of the worldwide British Empire. Had the British not imposed this system upon them, they would have been content to remain British citizens.

As soon as the Revolutionary War was won, the exact same debate erupted within the new American political system. Alexander Hamilton and his Federalists wished to replicate the British mercantilist system under an American government that would closely mirror the constitutional monarchy of Great Britain. The Federalists were the party of big government, national debt, corporate welfare, militarism, and central bank inflation¹.

They wished to preserve the status-quo insofar as the role of government and the nature of civil society was concerned, which benefited a privileged, wealthy elite. They were the conservatives.

Socially, this party was the less tolerant of dissenters and tended to promote religion as useful in informing public policy. During Adams’ presidency and with the Federalists in control of Congress, the Alien and Sedition Acts were passed, making it illegal to criticize the government. These also are core conservative principles.

Their opponents, Thomas Jefferson and his Democratic-Republicans, promoted exactly the opposite ideas. They wished to radically change the role of government in society to one that was strictly limited to enforcing the non-aggression principle of liberty, most importantly economic liberty. They were opposed to corporate welfare or any other government redistribution of wealth, railed against the dangers and injustice of standing armies and the national debt, and opposed the central bank. Over and over again when asked about the role of government, Jefferson consistently applied the non-aggression principle to arrive at an unambiguous answer. Always his answer supported each individual’s right to do as he pleased as long as he did not violate the rights of others, and to keep the fruits of his labor.

Jefferson and his followers insisted upon a “wall of separation” between church and state and denounced the Alien and Sedition Acts. They advocated free speech, civil liberties, and tolerance. These are core liberal principles.

While the conservatives gained the early lead due to George Washington’s election as president and subsequent appointment of Hamilton as treasury secretary, it was not a decisive victory. Washington, who along with Vice President John Adams was certainly a more moderate Federalist, also appointed Jefferson to his cabinet as secretary of state. This set the stage for an epic battle between the two ideologies after Washington departed from politics. Adams eventually broke with Hamilton and his party, costing him the 1800 election, and resulting in a decisive liberal victory by Jefferson and his Democratic-Republicans. For the next 60 years, it was the liberal ideology of individual liberty, limited government, and economic freedom that dominated federal politics.

During this time, the conservatives constantly fought to establish bigger government, the central bank, and the other tenets of mercantilism that defined American conservatism. After the Federalist Party disbanded, they were replaced by the Whigs, a party made up of the same people and advocating the same principles as the Federalists. By this time, Jefferson’s Democratic-Republicans had also had a split, and had emerged as the Democrats.

The Whigs were never successful in achieving their goals, and eventually disbanded. However, as before, the same people and the same principles of big government were back again in 1860, this time calling themselves “Republicans.” They finally won a decisive victory in electing Abraham Lincoln to the presidency and a majority in Congress. Immediately, the Republicans began implementing their agenda of corporate welfare, protectionist tariffs, and higher taxes. Contrary to conventional wisdom, it was this economic agenda (particularly the tariff) that motivated the southern states’ secession from the Union, not a disagreement over slavery.

It is vital to understand that the Republican Party was born as the party of big government, inheriting traditional, conservative big government principles from its conservative philosophical ancestors, the Whigs and Federalists. For most of its history, it has remained true to these principles, up to and including the Bush II administration. Barry Goldwater’s more libertarian platform during the 1960’s was a divisive anomaly in the conservative movement. Its popularity was later exploited by Ronald Reagan’s administration to implement the usual conservative philosophy of bigger government, militarism, and debt.

The problem for Americans today is that there is no longer an opposition party that represents a true antithesis of these principles. By the dawn of the 20th century, the Democrats had completely abandoned their core principles of individual liberty and economic freedom and adopted a socialist, democratic ideology of popular wealth redistribution. Where the Republicans continued to promote a system which plundered the many for the benefit of the privileged few, the Democrats no longer objected to government as an instrument of plunder and now merely fought to divide up the loot differently. They were no longer truly liberal, although they perverted that word in popular culture to mean exactly the opposite of what it really means. Since then, Americans have had to choose between two parties whose ideologies are fundamentally hostile to liberty.

One week ago, Congressman Ron Paul gave a speech at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) that both mainstream Republicans and Democrats disagree with. Of course they do. It was an eloquent articulation of America’s founding principles of individual liberty and limited government. Like Jefferson, Paul consistently applied the non-aggression principle of liberty to every aspect of government, concluding that we must end our worldwide military empire, end the welfare state (both corporate and popular), and get rid of the plundering Federal Reserve.

Socially, he advocated tolerance, civil liberties, and the right of every American to express his or her opinion, even if those opinions contradicted Paul’s own most preciously-held beliefs. Despite being likely the most truly Christian person in any branch of the federal government, he never once made any allusion to religion during his entire speech, except for a purely philosophical reference to Thomas Aquinas’ principle of the just war (he alluded to this as part of his anti-war argument). Young Americans for Liberty, an affiliate of Paul’s Campaign for Liberty, invited a gay pride group to the conference, invoking a bigoted outburst from one of the younger conservative speakers just before Paul took the stage. Paul’s followers roundly booed him out of the auditorium.

Ron Paul pitched his ideas as “conservative,” but they are not. During one point in the speech, libertarian radio commentator and publisher of Liberty Pulse, Kurt Wallace, turned to me and exclaimed delightedly, “Ron Paul is a radical!” He is. Like Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, and the rest of the most pro-liberty founders of the United States, Ron Paul is a radical liberal (in the true sense of the word “liberal”). He is also an extremist, in the true sense of that word. He refuses to compromise his principles regardless of the political consequences.

Average Americans elect Republicans because they believe that Republicans will give them small government, low taxes, and economic freedom. They are mistaken. What they are yearning for has nothing to do with the Republican Party or the more general ideology called “conservatism.” What they really want is radical change. They demonstrated this in giving Ron Paul a victory in the CPAC straw poll. They also proved once again that they are wiser than the political class in Washington. At this critical juncture in American history, there is only one thing that can bring America back from the brink of social, economic, and political collapse: radical, anti-conservative change from leviathan government to extreme liberty.

Source(s): ¹Thomas Dilorenzo’s books, Hamilton’s Curse and The Real Lincoln document the true roots and history of American conservatism superbly.

Tom Mullen -Independent Policy Analyst, Freelance Writer, and Business Consultant

Tom Mullen is a writer, musician, and business consultant. In January 2009, he published his first book, A Return to Common Sense: Reawakening Liberty in the Inhabitants of America. Tom was the opening speaker at the Revolution March in Washington, D.C. on July 12, 2008. The event was attended by over 10,000 supporters and included Thomas E. Woods, Jr., G. Edward Griffin, Naomi Wolf, and presidential candidate Ron Paul. In 2007, Tom released his first solo CD, A Glimpse of the Ether, containing 13 original compositions. Tom’s style has been described as “Powerpop with a hint of modern rock,” although there are a wide variety of styles represented in his music. During the 1990’s, he was lead singer, guitarist, and principle songwriter for The Skeptics, an alternative powerpop band that played for audiences all over the U.S., including opening shows for national acts The Tubes and 10,000 Maniacs. Tom has appeared twice on A.M. Buffalo with The Skeptics, and was also featured on Buffalo’s local music television broadcast, Nickel City Scene. Tom is originally a native of Buffalo, NY and graduate of Canisius College. He earned a Master’s Degree in English from State University of New York College at Buffalo. He now resides with his family in Tampa, FL. For more information, visit Tom’s website at www.tommullen.net.

Allison Bricker

“He who would learn to fly one day must first learn to stand and walk and run and climb and dance, one cannot fly into flying”. -Friedrich Nietzsche

BOWLING GREEN, KENTUCKY – On Monday, former Governor of Alaska, and 2008 Republican Vice-Presidential candidate, Sarah Palin endorsed Dr. Rand Paul¹ over his Primary opponent, Secretary of State, Trey Grayson stating:

“I’m proud to support great grass roots candidates like Dr. Paul — While there are issues we disagree on, he and I are both in agreement that it’s time to shake up the status quo in Washington and stand up for common sense ideas.” Sarah Palin Former Governor of Alaska

Recent polling was already showing Rand widening the gap substantially between himself and Grayson² as well as beating every possible Democratic contender in the General Election prior to Sarah the Rogue’s verbal thumbs-up, so it appears to this blogger at least, as more of a calculated political move by the former Governor, than a huge plus for Candidate Paul.

In addition to her official statement endorsing the younger Paul, her political action committee, SarahPAC donated $2,000 to the doctor’s already burgeoning campaign war chest, again mostly thanks to money-bombs from the grassroots and not PAC’s. Her endorsement, in conjunction with recent controversial actions taken by the Campaign for Liberty, the attempted co-opting of the Tea-Party movement by the likes of Dick Armey³ and indeed the questionable platform stances by Rand Paul himself have left many in the Liberty movement, myself included, scratching our heads. It begs the question whether cozying up to establishment figureheads will lead to a watering down of the message, or derail the momentum thus far gained on the road to restoring the Republic.

However, where some see the aforementioned as nails into the coffin of all the progress thus far, upon further contemplation, I see opportunity; opportunity to make strides towards the reclamation of our natural rights formerly unfathomable in the wake of the Bush administration, September 11th, and the status-quo’s brand of neo-patriotism.

Nevertheless, it was very deflating to listen early on to Scott Horton’s interview of Rand Paul over at Anti-War.com⁴. During the interview, the younger Paul espoused believing in the Chief Executive’s right to act unilaterally without a Declaration of War, support for continuing the war in Afghanistan, and the absurd notion of keeping Club Torture, i.e. Guantanamo up and running in lieu of a total and complete shuttering.

Additionally, while continuing to observe Rand’s campaign it seems pedantic to me when he offers, “term limits”, code for lazy democracy, as a way to combat corruption in Washington D.C. As we all know, the 22nd Amendment has done little to spare us of corrupt, disastrous, power-hungry Chief Executives. It has only succeeding in perpetrating the illusion of change with each successive changing of the puppet.

But wait, there is hope; Rand like his statesman father, understands the insidious parasitic relationship of the FEDERAL RESERVE and the U.S. government. This my fellow readers in my opinion is our “golden arrow”; our chance to come face to face with the absolute root which enables the promulgation of its siblings, the FEDERAL RESERVE. The reality that a private cartel of bankers and the cottage supporting industries, i.e. Goldman Sachs have intertwined themselves so tightly into government via currency creation and the endless list of their crony sycophants receiving high level cabinet and department level appointments are the core reason for the current dilapidated condition of our Constitutional Republic, once known as America.

The central banker puppet masters alone through legislation enacted almost a century age, ergo the FEDERAL RESERVE Act, 16th, and 17th Amendments succeeded in delegating ‘We the People’ as collateral to finance their odious debt, corrupted the Senate, and morphed us from Republic to populous democracy, whilst simultaneously bestowing upon themselves monopoly control over the currency.

Moreover fellow readers ask yourself this question, where was your political philosophy and understanding of the issues five, ten, twenty years ago? My sophomore year in high school for example, my mother and myself sat glued to the television watching Tom Brokaw declare Bill Clinton the 42nd President of the United States. Upon Mr. Brokaw’s announcement, I remember turning to my mother and asking, “Things are going to be better now –right?”

Up until the election of William Clinton, the previous Presidents were all ‘evil’ Republicans, save my infancy during the Carter administration, and we were a rust-belt working class “Democrat” family, so surely a Democrat in office would make life peachy. Unfortunately, reality painted a different picture and the election of Clinton was a furthering of my education rather than salvation for working-class families such as my own.

The actions of the Clinton Administration were the catalyst for me to dig beneath the nationalist sugary sweet veneer that was beat into my head throughout my tenure at government school. The nauseating actions undertaken especially by his Attorney General, Janet Reno forever removed my rose-colored glasses and prompted me to purchase my first copy of Thomas Paine’s Rights of Man/Common Sense from a local bookstore.

In addition, contrasted against the largely college-centric movement of the late 1960’s whereby the focus was largely on the dissatisfaction of college-aged anti-war protesters, the Liberty movement is not so one-dimensional.

We are made up of not only the 13th Generation, a generation literally written off in our infancy as “the lost generation”, the roots to the movement run deep and are of a diverse stock. The movement includes not only those of us in our 30’s and 40’s, but we also benefit from the excellent work undertaken at the college level by Young Americans for Liberty, and are blessed with the veteran elders of the movement like Dr. Paul, Lew Rockwell, and Judge Andrew Napolitano, to name just a few.

In addition to spanning generations, my time in the movement has afforded me the opportunity to meet those from every walk of life under the sun; black, white, yellow, red, Christian, atheist, rich, poor, queer, straight, it matters not. The liberty movement redefines “big-tent” simply as American, people-group be damned.

So please ask yourself the last time you can remember something that freely unified such a wide swath spanning generations, race, and class. Liberty, my fellow readers is a most glorious unifier like no other. Thus, this is why we shake the puppet masters to their core. Fear not the endorsement of “Sarah the Rogue”.

As such, as we all continue to learn and expand our understanding; we must make room for this to apply to individuals like Sarah Palin as well, and seize the opportunity to begin a dialog with her and her supporters about the insidious nature of Central Banking, true Constitutionally limited government, and the doctrine of just, not preemptive war.

The Kentucky Senate race is likely to be watched closely both to gauge the threat to the establishment’s entrenched power via the inclusion of a Paul in the Senate and to see if Democrats could steal the seat currently held by Senator Jim Bunning (R-KY) who announced his retirement last year. Let us seize the opportunity before us to spread the warm glow of the Sunshine of Liberty through educating and conversing with others on the principles of natural rights and the dangers of Central Banking.

Our posterity and our Republic deserve no less and the opportunity before us has never before in my lifetime been so self-evident.

Source(s): ¹Rand Paul U.S. Senate Campaign Website “Sarah Palin Endorses” by David Adams 02/01/2010 • ²Public Policy Polling “Paul Takes Big Lead in GOP Primary” 12/22/2009 • ³ Huffington Post “Operation Steele/Armey: GOP/Tea party Co Opt Each Other” by Alex Brant-Zawadzki published: December 17, 2009 • ⁴Scott Horton Interviews Rand Paul May 17, 2009 •

Wire Report

Andy Worthington – Journalist/Author
	Andy Worthington is the author of The Guantánamo Files: The Stories of the 774 Detainees in America’s Illegal Prison (published by Pluto Press) and serves as policy advisor to the Future of Freedom Foundation. Visit his website at: www.andyworthington.co.uk.

(WIRE FFF) – Last Tuesday, a little-known court — the Court of Military Commissions Review — convened to hear appeals in the cases of the only two men sentenced in the military commission trial system established by Congress in 2006, after the first version, conceived by Vice President Dick Cheney and his close advisors in November 2001, was ruled illegal by the U.S. Supreme Court.¹

The two men in question — Salim Hamdan and Ali Hamza al-Bahlul — were tried and convicted in 2008, but whereas Hamdan, a driver for Osama bin Laden, had the major charge against him (conspiracy) dismissed by a military jury in August 2008, and was sentenced to serve just six months for providing material support to terrorism², al-Bahlul, who made a video promoting al-Qaeda and is regularly described as al-Qaeda’s “media secretary,” was convicted of conspiracy, solicitation of murder, and providing material support to terrorism, and received a life sentence in November 2008.

Under consideration are two specific questions: firstly, whether providing material support to terrorism is a valid basis for conviction in a war crimes court; and, secondly, whether al-Bahlul’s trial was unfair because he was denied the right to represent himself.

On the first point, lawyers have always maintained that providing material support to terrorism is not a valid war crime. In an email exchange last week, Lt. Col. David Frakt, who represented al-Bahlul before his trial, explained, “It has always been my position that material support to terrorism was a fabricated war crime that was not traditionally triable in a military commission as of the time of Mr. al-Bahlul and Mr. Hamdan’s affiliation with al-Qaeda, but rather was illegally retroactively applied to them several years after the fact.”

As Lt. Col. Frakt also mentioned, the problems with the material-support charges had been advanced by Hamdan’s attorneys in a pre-trial motion to dismiss the charge back in February 2008, when they also attempted to dismiss the conspiracy charge for the same reason. On July 16, the judge in Hamdan’s case, Army Capt. Keith Allred, rejected the motion to dismiss on ex post facto grounds, finding that “conspiracy and material support for terrorism have traditionally been considered violations of the law of war,” as Human Rights First explained in a summary of Hamdan’s case.³

Assist. Attrny. Gen. David S. Kris Statement to Comm. of Armed Srvcs U.S. Senate July 7, 2009 (PDF 61KB)

However, as Lt. Col. Frakt described it, Allred indicated that it was “a very close issue. Although he acknowledged that the crime of material support to terrorism had never been the subject of charges in a military commission before, he reasoned that similar conduct, essentially being part of an armed insurgent group committing war crimes against civilians, had been treated as a war crime in the past, such as during the U.S. Civil War. He argued that Congress was merely providing a new name to conduct that had always been treated as a law of war offense triable by military commission.”

Significantly, Lt. Col. Frakt added, “What Captain Allred ignored is that what Mr. Hamdan was charged with was essentially serving as a personal driver and servant to Osama bin Laden and there was no indication of involvement in any war crimes, against civilians or otherwise.”

Even more significantly, when the Obama administration and Congress revived the Commissions last summer, David Kris, a senior Justice Department official in the National Security Division, testified that the Justice Department had concluded that material support to terrorism was not a traditional war crime and should be removed from the new version of the Military Commissions Act. As Kris explained:

“While this is a very important offense in our counter-terrorism prosecutions in Federal Court … there are serious questions as to whether material support for terrorism or terrorist groups is a traditional violation of the rules of war … our experts believe that there is a significant risk that appellate courts will ultimately conclude that material support for terrorism is not a traditional law of war offense, thereby reversing hard-won convictions and leading to questions about the system’s legitimacy.”

David S. Kris
U.S. Assistant Attorney General
Department of Justice
National Security Division

As Lt. Col. Frakt explained to me, despite Kris’ concerns, “Congress rejected this sound advice and included material support to terrorism in the revised 2009 MCA, possibly in part because I advised CongressNov when I testified that if they removed this crime from statute there would be very few detainees left to prosecute.”

Noticeably, Kris was more enthusiastic about retaining the conspiracy charge, but as I explained in an article in November, “this, too, is fraught with problems. In Hamdan v. Rumsfeld, the case in which the Supreme Court shut down the Commissions’ first incarnation, Justice John Paul Stevens, in an opinion in which he was joined by three other justices, made a point of mentioning that ‘conspiracy’ has not traditionally been considered a war crime.”

In Hamdan’s case, a successful appeal on the material support charge would have little practical effect, as he is already a free man⁴ (although Charles Schmitz, who served as his interpreter during proceedings at Guantánamo, told the Wall Street Journal that it was “important to him to clear the conviction,” because “In Yemen, they look at him as a criminal. He’s been tainted.”).⁵

To be honest, a successful appeal on the material support charge would mean little to al-Bahlul either, although, it would, of course, fulfill the Justice Department’s own fears about including it in the new legislation, especially as the Obama administration has already announced its intention of using it against several prisoners currently held at Guantánamo.

It remains to be seen, of course, whether material support and/or conspiracy survive an appeal, but in court last week, lawyers for al-Bahlul pushed both points. As the Wall Street Journal described it, Michel Paradis, representing al-Bahlul, argued that the charges on which al-Bahlul was convicted “weren’t traditionally considered war crimes under international law, and thus Congress in 2006 couldn’t retroactively make them so. International law strongly discourages viewing conspiracy as a war crime. Providing material support for terrorism, while a domestic U.S. crime since the 1990s, has never been considered a war crime.”

Ingeniously, the lawyers also argued that al-Bahlul’s production of propaganda material for al-Qaeda should have been protected by the First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, guaranteeing freedom of speech. One of his attorneys, Mike Berrigan, told reporters, “Mr. al-Bahlul’s conduct in making this documentary — his prosecution for that conduct — was a violation of the U.S. First Amendment. Not that Mr. al-Bahlul had particular First Amendment rights, but the constitutional restrictions on the U.S. government prosecuting someone for speech made the prosecution itself illegal. Mr. al-Bahlul’s conduct in making that documentary does not come close to the standard of inciting violence that can be criminalized.”⁶

The prosecution disagreed, of course, and Navy Capt. Edward White, who argued for the government at the appeal, stated, “Our position was that, as an enemy combatant waging war against the United States from abroad, he does not have First Amendment rights. He crossed the line into criminally, soliciting other people — inducing, enticing, encouraging, persuading them — to commit war crimes.”

Beyond all these claims, however, the most disturbing aspect of al-Bahlul’s conviction is the nature of his trial, and what Lt. Col. Frakt described to me as his “best hope” is that the Court of Military Commission Review will recognize that the one-sided trial, in which he refused to mount a defense, was fundamentally unfair — or, as Lt. Col. Frakt put it, the judge’s “denial of his right to self-representation essentially denied him of a fair trial because the judge knew that he would not allow me to represent him.”

This was indeed what happened. Al-Bahlul sought strenuously to represent himself, but although his request was granted by Army Col. Peter Brownback, his first judge in the revived Commissions, Brownback was then involuntarily retired from the Army, and the new judge, Air Force Col. Ronald Gregory, revoked al- Bahlul’s pro se status (his right to represent himself).

As I explained at the time, after Maj. Frakt (as he was at the time) announced that al-Bahlul was boycotting the trial, because he wished to represent himself, and did not wish to be represented by a military lawyer, Frakt then asked to be relieved, noting that he was obliged to respect his client’s wishes. When Col. Gregory refused, he declared that he too was unable to participate. “I will be joining Mr. al-Bahlul’s boycott of the proceedings,” he said, “standing mute at the table.” He then refused to answer any further questions from Col. Gregory, even though the judge attempted to argue that he was “obliged to participate,” before conceding that it was not in his power to force him to do so. As Lt. Col. Frakt described it to me last week, Col. Gregory’s actions “ensured there would be no defense at all in the final military commission trial of the Bush era.”

Lt. Col. Frakt also explained that, although appeals are automatic in the Commissions unless waived in writing, the only reason that al-Bahlul failed to waive his right to appeal in writing was because he “refused to accept any papers from his lawyers or the court.” As Frakt described it, “Mr. al-Bahlul made it plain to me that he did not wish to appeal any conviction and he categorically refused to meet with his appointed appellate counsel to discuss any possible grounds for appeal.”

Lt. Col. Frakt was full of praise for the lawyers attempting to defend al-Bahlul, even though they “were hampered by the fact that I did not preserve any issues for appeal (other than the self-representation issue) because I did not speak during the entire trial.” He noted that they “managed to find a way to raise a number of interesting and important issues that strike at the core of the legitimacy of the military commissions,” but in the end, what is most noticeable about al-Bahlul’s case is how he remains in a position of extraordinary isolation at Guantánamo.

Not only is he imprisoned, alone, to serve out his life sentence, but as Lt. Col. Frakt explained, “it remains a mystery what will happen to Mr. al-Bahlul. Although he is serving a life sentence, under current U.S. law, he can’t be transferred out of Guantánamo to a prison on the mainland because detainees can only be transferred to the U.S. to face trial.”

Unless he is to stay in Guantánamo, as the prison slowly empties around him, until, perhaps, he is the only prisoner left, it seems, as Lt. Col. Frakt also explained, that “special legislation will be required” to enable him to leave Guantánamo, even if it is just to resume his life sentence elsewhere.

Lost in the system, essentially, Ali Hamza al-Bahlul is another example of the way in which justice at Guantánamo never progressed much beyond an ad hoc system full of holes, and, whatever the outcome of these appeals, it should give the Obama administration some salutary reminders as to why the commissions remain an unsuitable system for any kind of credible trial.

© 2001-2010 The Future of Freedom Foundation. All rights reserved.

Source(s): ¹HAMDAN v. RUMSFELD, SECRETARY OF DEFENSE, ET AL. CERTIORARI TO THE UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA CIRCUIT No. 05–184. Argued March 28, 2006—Decided June 29, 2006 • ²The UK Guardian “Profile: Salim Ahmed Hamdan” by Mark Tran published Tuesday, June 5th, 2007 • ³Human Rights First, “In the Courts: The Case of Salim Ahmed Hamdan” • ⁴The Star “Bin Laden’s Driver Talk” by Michelle Shephard, published Monday, August 17, 2009 • ⁵The Wall Street Journal “White House Defends Use of War Crime Tribunals” by Jess Bravin • ⁶Voice of America “US Military Panel Hears 1st Guantanamo Appeal” by Michael Bowman, published January 26, 2010

The Smoking Argus

Dr. Paul outlines the gathering perfect storm fomented by the federal government as a result of our multiple wars, banker bailouts, and reckless devaluing of the Dollar via the FEDERAL RESERVE. Yet as the litany of problems spiral out of control, politicians in the District of Columbia remain content to meddle even further into areas never intended by the Founding Generation. As consequence, their blatant disregard for the Constitution as outdated reference manual in lieu of the Supreme Law of the Land ensures the unintended consequences of their actions will expand government further beyond its proper role of preventing/prosecuting acts of violence, fraud, and the equal enforcement of contracts.

Thus, as Representative Ron Paul explains, the burdensome laws outside the aforementioned scope suffocate the ability of the people and communities to formulate practical solutions unique to their circumstances.

Related Material(s)
	Rep. Ron Paul Texas Straight Talk: The Very Busy Politicians in Washington D.C. TRANSCRIPT (PDF 12.5 Kb)

Source(s): U.S. House of Representatives, Office of Representative Ron Paul, “Texas Straight Talk” Oct. 19, 2009 • Minnesota Chris YouTube Channel

Allison Bricker

At an October 12th town hall meeting in Greensboro, South Carolina, Senator Lindsey Graham (R) accused Representative Ron Paul of ‘hijacking’ the Republican Party, stating:

“I’m going to grow this party. I’m not going to let it be hijacked by Ron Paul”,

Senator Lindsey Graham
October 12th, 2009

The Senator’s terse tone a result of hecklers in the meeting chastising the former supporter of John McCain’s abysmal failure of a presidential bid, for voting in support of banker bailouts via the TARP program, as well as his support for extending the PATRIOT Act and President Obama’s troop surge in Afghanistan.

However, my view differs greatly with that of Senator Graham’s. Where he sees a “hijacking”, I see liberation from a party occupied for far too long by insurgent Whigs, perhaps the 2.0 variety, but Whigs nonetheless.

After all, today’s so-called “mainstream republicans” are just are just as backwards with their perpetual warmongering, chicken hawk imperialism, banker bailout, torture-apologist agenda, as were their predecessors; Whigs 1.0 from the 19th century in their support of denying inherent liberties to African-Americans via the promulgation and expansion of slavery.

As such, never failing to parallel their political coverage to a style more befitting of a magazine show like “Extra”, (think Election Day holograms) CNN’s Wolf Blitzer and his merry panel of peanut-gallery talking heads invited Representative Ron Paul into ‘The Situation room” Wednesday evening. Practically salivating for an attempt to degrade the issue into a worthless petty verbal dispute, host Wolf Blitzer sophomorically began by asking Dr. Paul for his “reaction”.

Always the statesman more concerned with principle, Dr. Paul pulled the debate back between working to support the Constitution, or further allowing the status quo to persist with its utter disregard for one of our most cherished founding documents. In consequence to the tone set by Mr. Blitzer, the other commentator/old-media journalists could not seem to structure a question without first displaying a philosophical bias for government to intervene in as many areas of our lives as possible.

The only exception to the vacuous line of dribble was Arianna Huffington of The Huffington Post. So kudos to her for demonstrating some new-media moxy soliciting Representative Ron Paul’s opinion on the true issues at hand like the never-ending war in Afghanistan.

Allison Bricker

WASHINGTON D.C. – Senior Associate Justice, John Paul Stevens, is fueling speculation that he may leave the Supreme Court in 2010, following his hiring of only one law clerk in lieu of the standard three or four. Former President Gerald Ford first appointed Associate Justice Stevens to the high court in 1975, thus giving him the distinction of being the only current member to serve along side three different Chief Justices.

In April of next year, Associate Justice Stevens will celebrate his ninetieth birthday, thus providing increased attention by both pundits and politicos to his early hiring practices. The speculation for Associate Justice Stevens’ retirement is based upon Associate Justice David Souter’s decision also to hire only one law clerk prior to announcing his leaving the court this April’s past.

A native of Chicago, many consider Associate Justice Stevens to be the most outspoken member of the Supreme Court’s loose constructionist wing. However, conventional wisdom indicates his potential retirement is unlikely to change the perceived slant of the court. As was also the case with the retirement of Associate Justice Souter, whereby President Barack Obama nominated and the Senate confirmed the appointment of Associate Justice Sony Sotomayor who by her own admission is a loose constructionist.

Nevertheless, prevailing punditry proved contrary to reality at least twice in American history with the appointments of Associate Justice Souter and Chief Justice Warren who both revealed a loose constructionist point of view during their tenures on the Supreme Court.

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Allison Bricker

DES MOINES, IOWA – An H1N1 (Swine-Flu) quarantine document found on the Iowa Department of Public Health¹ (IDoPH) website quickly circulated the internet causing a public relations headache for health officials in Iowa. Public health officials responded that the form was merely a template based on the limited use of such quarantine orders of the past and that no such orders were currently in effect. Further, IDoH, Public Information Officer, Polly Carver-Kimm states that she does not expect to see any such orders issued this fall due to the spread of H1N1.

Ms. Carver-Kimm went on to say that if the need ever did arise, public officials in Iowa most often opt to request voluntary home quarantine out of respect for an individual’s rights. She continued, that a form causing the uproar was used sparingly in the case of several homeless Iowans who contracted Tuberculosis (TB) and where thus confined to the hospital for treatment and monitoring.

From a historical standpoint, the authority to enforce quarantine is considered a state police power reserved explicitly under the Tenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution². Dating back to as early as 1796, Congress explicitly sought to restrict involvement by the federal government except in manners of outbreaks crossing state lines, borders, and ports of entry. Moreover, the 4th Congress enacted legislation to ensure the federal government was confined further to a supervisory role, allowing intervention only upon dereliction of a state(s) duty to control the spread beyond the initial outbreak or if the situation deteriorates into domestic insurrection, or requested by the several states governments.³

Additionally, several Supreme Court⁴ and district court decisions ^{5, 6} have upheld this principle of state’s rights in conjunction with the right of the people to challenge their quarantine under the Tenth Amendment when such quarantine is found to be “unreasonable, unjust, and oppressive”.

(PDF 4MB)

Nevertheless, the federal government under the Bush administration sought to circumvent the Constitution and the reinforcement thereof by numerous Supreme Court decisions in order to seize additional unConstitutional powers to the federal government under HSPD-5, HSPD-8, and P.L. 109-364, § 1076.

Coordinating the specific steps of what many see as further federal intrusion, the Homeland Security Council⁷ (HSC) issued the “National Strategy for Pandemic Influenza Implementation Plan” (NSPIIP) in 2006 linking the federal government’s response to the World health Organization’s (WHO) “Phase of Pandemic Alert”. Currently the WHO phase is at its highest level, pandemic-alert 6 in response to the outbreak of H1N1 from this past spring. Consequently, according to the NSPIIP, the response to a phase 6 alert instructs the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) in Conjunction with DHS to:

“Activate domestic quarantine stations and ensure coordination at State, local, and tribal level, especially with health care resources.”

National Strategy for Pandemic Influenza Implementation Plan, 2006
Page 37

As of the writing of this report, Ms. Carver-Kimm has not received briefing from either DHS or HHS regarding the “domestic quarantine stations”. Additionally, calls placed to both the DHS and HHS have yielded no response regarding whether or not the quarantine stations are currently active as called for in NSIIP in conjunction with WHO alert level 6.

Source(s): ¹Iowa Department of Health Quarantine Order • ²CRS, FEDERAL and STATE QUARANTINE and ISOLATION AUTHORITY, by:Kathleen S. Swendimann, Attrny. & Jenifer K. Elsa, Attrny. – published January 23rd, 2007, Summary • ³ 5 Annals of Congress 1349-59 (1796) • ⁴ MORGAN’S STEAMSHIP CO. V. LOUISIANA BOARD OF HEALTH, 118 U. S. 455 (1886) • ⁵ State v. Snow 324 S.W.2d 532 (Ark. 1959) • ⁶ Wong Wai v. Williamson 103 F. Rep. 10 (1900) & Jew Ho v. Williamson 103 F. Rep. 15 (1900) • ⁷Homeland Security Council, “National Strategy for Pandemic Influenza Implementation Plan” 2006 •

Allison Bricker

On Wednesday, we posted the Digg/Wall Street Journal interview of Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner along with analysis provided by the Corbett Report. During the approximately twenty-minute interview, Secretary Geithner indicated that both the author of legislation such as H.R. 1207 and its vocal supporters must understand that opening the FEDERAL RESERVE’s books to Sunlight would “politicize the process”.

“The FED actually is subject to very comprehensive oversight by the Congress, by a series of external auditors…but you want to keep politics out of monetary policy. There are good reasons for that.”

 

Timothy Geithner
Secretary of the Treasury

Yes keeping politics out of monetary policy is important Secretary Geithner, and that is exactly why we need a full audit of the FEDERAL RESERVE.

Secretary Geithner is partially correct in his statement that the FEDERAL RESERVE is audited. What he fails to mention however, is that the transactions, which hold the potential to cause the greatest widespread damage; those dealing with foreign governments, other central banks, and international financial institutions, are prohibited from audit, and thus remain cloaked from any oversight whatsoever.

As such, H.R. 1207 and S. 604, both just barely over two-pages in length, merely seek to remove the aforementioned prohibitions thereby allowing Congress and ‘We the People’ to see the full impact of the FEDERAL RESERVE’s international dealings.

Thus, the potential for politicization comes not from the act or principle of demanding true transparency and accountability, but possibly from the FED’s own actions. It is not beyond possibility that a full-unabated audit could expose foreign interactions, which resemble those more closely aligned with that of a government unto itself than those of a central bank built for “economic stability”.

Foreign policy decisions, ergo the business of allies, enemies, and the subsequent support thereof financially or otherwise is  first and foremost a function of the United States Senate via its Constitutional authority of making and ratifying treaties.

It is most certainly not the purview of a private central bank shrouded in secrecy via a most repugnant unconstitutional regulation.

In conclusion, either allow the repeal of the prohibition contained in TITLE 31>SUBTITLE 1>CHAPTER 7> SUBCHAPTER II > § 714 > PARAGRAPH (b) or sell the idea of letting a central bank exist and operate under the cover of darkness as an Amendment to the United States Constitution.

As there are those of us who are indeed willing to pledge our lives, fortunes, and sacred honors to see the FEDERAL RESERVE meet with the same fate as the previous two Central Banks of the United States.

The Smoking Argus

ATLANTA, GEORGIA – Kurt Wallace, formerly of  Break the Matrix, has undertaken a new project to find the best pro-liberty/freedom movement articles and videos from around the new-media blogosphere. Kurt is seeking to expand upon the niche originally fostered by Matt Drudge of ‘The Drudge Report’ only obviously biased towards the expansion of freedom and a restoration of the Constitution.

Mr. Wallace feels that even in the environment of micro-blogging sites such as Twitter as well as the larger blogosphere itself, there is still a role for media aggregation. The idea first occurred to him after he would spend hours scouring the old-media news sites and blogosphere in preperation for his radio show. Thus last week the ‘Liberty Pulse’ officially went live with a full bevy of pro-liberty news. Currently the site is not monetized, but plans to offer advertising sometime in the near future.

On the Web: LibertyPulse.com

Allison Bricker

Liberty activists flex fundraising muscle for Rand Paul.

BOWLING GREEN, KENTUCKY – In what became a familiar scene during the Republican Presidential Primary season, Liberty activists and bloggers came together amidst a recession to raise almost a half-a-million Dollars for Rand Paul’s Senate bid in Kentucky. The grassroots funding mechanism in conjunction with the latest poll results released earlier in the week lend even further credence to that Dr. Rand Paul is a legitimate threat to both his Republican Primary opponent, current Secretary of State, Trey Grayson and to either Democrat he could face next fall.

The success of yesterday’s moneybomb could realistically place his campaign on pace to out raise Secretary Grayson for the third quarter of 2009. Since making its official announcement on August 5th, the Paul campaign has managed a start most first time candidates can only dream about attaining. Many beltway analysts attribute his ability to capture radio and television appearances due to the brand created by his father, current Texas Congressional Representative, Ron Paul.

However, liberty activists point out that while name recognition is most certainly helpful, Rand Paul’s biggest asset is his admiration and dedication to defending the U.S. Constitution; perhaps even more so at a time when both major parties are seen ever increasingly as one in the same and whose approval ratings are also dismally similar. They point to the fundraising success of economist Peter Schiff who is considering a run for U.S. Senate against Senate Banking Chairman, Christopher Dodd in Connecticut. To date, Mr. Schiff, who is best known for forecasting the current economic collapse and deflating of the housing bubble, has managed to raise over $800,000 in donations whilst still in the exploratory phases of his campaign.

Whether the comparisons of Dr. Ron Paul to General Washington, who lost several opening battles to the American Revolution, but in the end won an unprecedented victory from the super power of the day, come to pass, remains to be seen. Nevertheless, the tireless band of new-media patriots along with candidates like Peter Schiff, Rand Paul, and Iraq veteran Adam Kokesh have the potential to indeed secure an intellectual revolution; the likes of which have not been seen since the ‘Age of Reason’.