Geiger on Dodd's Neutering of Bush's Torture Law <!-- Hotlist crap --> Excerpt

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http://bobgeiger.blogspot.com/2005/03/kill-bill-neutering-bushs-torture-law.html

Mon Nov 20, 2006 at 16:18:24 PM EST Bob Geiger, the blogosphere's resident expert on all things Senate related, has authored a comprehensive analysis of how Senator Christopher Dodd's  Effective Terrorist Prosecution Act (S.4060) fixes the Military Commissions Act of 2006, how it works, and what it does. The MCA is more commonly known as the torture bill or the habeas corpus bill as it effectively legalizes the former and removes the latter. Geiger explains the changes to narrow the definition of "unlawful enemy combatant," bar evidence gained through torture, block hearsay evidence from being used in military tribunals, add an autonomous appeals process to military tribunals, require congressional oversight of how the Geneva Conventions are interpreted by the Executive, have a speedy judicial review of the MCA, and, most importantly, reinstate habeas corpus protections.

Here's what Geiger writes about habeas corpus portion of Dodd's  bill:

Restoring Habeas Corpus Protections

No area of the MCA has drawn more justifiable fire than the section suspending Habeas Corpus -- the rights of people deemed by the White House to be "enemy combatants" to challenge the legality of their arrest and detention.

Section 7 of the MCA says that "No court, justice, or judge shall have jurisdiction to hear or consider an application for a writ of habeas corpus filed by or on behalf of an alien detained by the United States who has been determined by the United States to have been properly detained as an enemy combatant or is awaiting such determination."

In other words, don't bother calling a lawyer, because you have no rights.

The fact that so many of these enemy-combatant determinations rest in the president's hands and the sheer vagueness of the law, combine to create a wide variety of scenarios whereby any American citizen could be arrested and held indefinitely without Constitutional protections.

Scary stuff indeed and, as surgical as the Dodd amendment is in many ways, this area is dealt with via a repeal of that entire section, thus killing this debasement of our Constitution in one fell swoop.

"The Administration-backed law eliminates the principle of Habeas Corpus which has served as the backbone of common law since before the Magna Carta in the 13th century," said Dodd. "Under the writ of Habeas Corpus independent courts may review the legality of custody decisions. My legislation would restore this basic tenet in the context of military commissions."

And it does it with one short sentence -- "Section 7(a) of the Military Commissions Act of 2006, is repealed," reads Dodd's legislation.