"Former U.S. President Bill Clinton and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton urged the Bush administration to use caution before any military action against Iraq."

CNN.com - Clintons urge caution on action against Iraq - August 31, 2002

"It has never happened in history that a nation that has won a war has been held accountable for atrocities committed in preparing for and waging that war. We intend to make this one different. What took place was the use of technological material to destroy a defenseless country. From 125,000 to 300,000 people were killed... We recognize our role in history is to bring the transgressors to justice." Ramsey Clark

Ramsey Clark served as U.S. Attorney General in the administration of Lyndon Johnson. He is the convener of the Commission of Inquiry and a human rights lawyer of world-wide respect. This report was given in New York, May 11, 1991.

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This has gone on far too long.

A Report on United States War Crimes Against Iraq to the Commission of Inquiry for the International War Crimes Tribunal

This is an extremely frightening development in the United States of America:

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Lawyers for President Bush have concluded he can launch an attack on Iraq without new approval from Congress, in part because they say permission remains in force from the 1991 resolution giving Bush's father authority to wage war in the Persian Gulf, according to administration officials.

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"We don't want to be in the legal position of asking Congress to authorize the use of force when the president already has that full authority," said a senior administration official involved in setting the strategy. "We don't want, in getting a resolution, to have conceded that one was constitutionally necessary."

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Inside the White House, a full-throated debate over some of these issues has been underway for some time. In particular, White House Counsel Alberto R. Gonzales had his deputy, Timothy E. Flanigan, develop the administration's legal position on questions surrounding a war with Iraq.

Officials said Gonzales told Bush earlier this month that he would not be legally bound to obtain approval for action against Iraq. In making this case, officials point first to the Constitution's designation of the president as commander-in-chief.

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Although administration officials are adamant that no authorization is required, some have begun to argue internally that it might be desirable as a matter of politics and statesmanship.

"The legal question and the practical question may be very different," one administration official said. "There is a view that while there is not a legal necessity to seek anything further, as a matter of statesmanship and politics and practicality, it's necessary -- or at a minimum, strongly advisable -- to do it."

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When you hear the "left wing zealots" say Bush may be our last President, think about more than one meaning, not just the obvious one. It is patently absurd that Iraq poses any threat to the United States.

[ Originally from Hijexx, comments edited for brevity and stridency-removal. --Rek ]

Bush Aides Say Iraq War Needs No Hill Vote

"The secretive federal court that approves spying on terror suspects in the United States has refused to give the Justice Department broad new powers, saying the government had misused the law and misled the court dozens of times, according to an extraordinary legal ruling released yesterday."

The court system is often an effective check against excess by the legislature and executive. This is one of the pieces of the system that works most of the time. Exceptions include drug related search and seizure.

Secret Court Rebuffs Ashcroft (washingtonpost.com)

Lawrence Lessig presentation at OSCON.

free_culture

Unbelievable. This country is going to hell in a handbasket.

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this year, the university in Chapel Hill is asking all 3,500 incoming freshmen to read a book about Islam and finds itself besieged in federal court and across the airwaves by Christian evangelists and other conservatives.

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But a national TV talk show host, Fox News Network's Bill O'Reilly, compared the assignment to teaching "Mein Kampf" in 1941 and questioned the purpose of making freshmen study "our enemy's religion."

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To the university's critics, it's about maintaining America's moral backbone in the war on terrorism.

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But some evangelical Christian leaders -- including the Rev. Franklin Graham, who gave the invocation at Bush's inauguration -- have denounced Islam since Sept. 11 as an "evil" religion. Despite the furor those remarks have caused, Graham repeated in radio and television appearances this week that the Koran preaches violence and that terrorism is supported by "mainstream" Muslims around the world.

Welcome to Amerikkka!

A Timely Subject -- and a Sore One (washingtonpost.com) [Islamic studies at UNC]

"Legal experts believe that if the ruling is upheld, it could easily become a firm legal precedent across the European Union, drastically limiting the information that many European search engines are allowed to provide to their users.
"The situation is very dangerous for the whole Internet," said NewsClub founder Christian Kohlschütter. "It's absolutely insane." "

The European courts are unravelling the Internet, mostly through ignorance rather then malice, but who do you fear more: An idiot with a gun, or an evil genius with a gun?

The train wreck between the first amendment and intellectual property that I predicted in 1996 is well under way, if you haven't noticed.

Deep Linking Takes Another Blow

"Hilary Rosen of the Recording Industry Association of America says this issue shouldn't be presented as big labels vs. mom-and-pop operations: "If you don't have a business model that sustains your costs, it sounds harsh, but that's real life. If a grocery store can't afford to pay for the vegetables, they can't keep their doors open.""

USA Today reports on the impending closure of 10,000 internet radio stations. Rosen says "Let them eat cake."

USATODAY.com - Royalty fees killing most Internet radio stations

Great article and discussion on the recent refusal of the U.S. to join the ICC.

kuro5hin.org || technology and culture, from the trenches

Welcome to America! Land of the Free, Brave, and Unaccountable:

The first permanent world criminal court, dreamed of for decades, became a reality on Monday -- even as the United States fought tooth and nail to avoid its jurisdiction over humanity's most heinous crimes.

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The United States has threatened to withdraw from all U.N.-authorised peacekeeping missions around the world if the 15-nation U.N. Security Council fails to grant it assurances that U.S. nationals are safe from the court's grasp.

Dreamed-Of World War Crimes Court Becomes Reality - Yahoo! News