Power at the ballot box

 good luck to the people of Brazil today.

USS Cole case

 The fact that so many of the men still held at Guantanamo have been tortured by our government should make all of us ashamed... but alas. It seems the Judge in the USS Cole case doesn't really believe that this particular defendant/prisoner lacks competency because he answers "yes" when asked if he understands what is going on... but anyway.

....the judge has ordered a competency exam, called a 706 Sanity Board, for the defendant, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri. The judge ordered a military medical panel that includes an Army psychiatrist to evaluate the prisoner and report back by Oct. 16, the day before the court travels to Guantanamo for panel selection, which is scheduled to begin on Oct. 19. 

Defense lawyers brought a forensic psychiatrist, Dr. Terry Kupers, to Guantanamo last month to evaluate al-Nashiri, who has been in U.S. custody since 2002, with the first four years spent in solitary confinement in CIA prisons. The previous judge in the case found al-Nashiri’s torture and abuse disqualified the use of his confessions to federal agents.

His lawyers have now gone further, arguing he is not competent to stand trial based on the expert opinion of Dr. Kupers, a civilian who spent eight hours with al-Nashiri in August and reviewed earlier medical reports. Dr. Kupers concluded that the prisoner has a traumatic brain injury, neurocognitive disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and a major depressive disorder. Those last two findings were consistent with the conclusion of a military medical board that examined al-Nashiri by court order in 2013. Al-Nashiri’s attorneys have now filed an opinion by Dr. Kupers concluding that al-Nashiri “lacks capacity to stand trial because he is unable to understand the nature of the proceedings or to conduct or cooperate intelligently in the defense of the case.”

On Sept. 16 the judge, Army Col. Matthew Fitzgerald, disagreed in a ruling that cited “the weight of the evidence reflecting on the accused’s capacity, which spans a period of decades, indicates that he possesses the capacity to stand trial.” In the same ruling, however, he ordered “out of an abundance of caution” that a doctor conduct an inquiry on al-Nashiri’s capacity to stand trial.

 read the rest here.

and our awful history repeats itself ...

 For a time at Guantanamo we held detainees in cages.  You can go on line and find photos.

Now we know that people held by our current government in a detention facility in Florida were also held in cages. You can read/hear more

here.

I just want to point out one difference between the abhorrent treatment of the men at Guantanamo and the similarly abhorrent treatment of people in Florida at "alligator alcatraz." The people  in Florida supposedly had (I say Had because the place was closed down recently) constitutional protections because they were here in the U.S. of A.  Many of the arguments relating to Guantanamo had to do with the fact that the men were held offshore and not in the U.S.. We had to fight for whatever rights those men might be entitled to at the offshore gulag. The people held in Florida should have had the protection of our constitution.

Oh, and yesterday was "constitution day."

So much for that.

In other news...

 Individuals from Somali have been kidnapped by my government and instead of being sent back home, as they were told, they are being held at Guantanamo.

read more here.

Maybe a "detention" review for Abu Zubaydah

 

You can read more about this unfortunate man in this blog. He was tortured over a period of months. Water boarded countless times. Eventually the government acknowledged that he was a nobody in the "war on terror". Yet he is still held 25 years now. No charges have ever been lodged against him and never will. I doubt that the military will do the right thing. Especially during this awful time in my government.

That said:

After 20 years at Guantanamo without charges, alleged Bin Laden associate AbuZubaydah faces a rare detention review, exposing the secrecy surrounding post-9/11military justice.

Once portrayed as a senior Al Qaeda figure, Zubaydah was tortured at CIA black sites,left permanently injured and still never charged, raising questions about U.S.accountability.

His lawyers argue he no longer poses a threat and should be transferred under strictmonitoring, as a review board weighs whether indefinite detention can still be justified.

read more here. (sorry I do not have a free link!).

lest we forget

 September 12, 1977.

yes. 25 years and we still have not learned a damned thing....

 But the good news is that the Talking Dog (Unlike our f''in liar of a president, the Dog was in Manhattan close to the twin towers at the time of the attack) is back with his annual post. You can read the whole post here. Here is a snippet:

And we talked about the insane stupidity of it all. It was just impossible to believe that our country and the people in it could consistently learn every conceivable wrong lesson, and do the absolute stupidest and counter-productive thing at every single turn. And yet, here we are. The divisiveness of turning against the other just because they don’t look like us? Check. A pointlessly aggressive foreign policy almost calculated to create foreign enemies who might act against us? Check. A decision that we have to destroy our liberties to preserve our precious (and failing) “American way of life” to save it? Check. And that’s before we talk about the total surveillance state, or the normalization of torture or the use of concentration camps and dungeons, or of course, yet another “preemptive war” in the Middle East. This time without a “coalition of the willing.” Oh, and did I mention a weird decision (seemingly a matter of a personal bribe) to permit a certain Middle Eastern nation whose nationals constituted 15 of 19 highjack perpetrators to have the means to build nuclear weapons.

And yet. And yet people like us continue to take the time and trouble to attend these sort of events, even if it seems like hitting your heads against the wall. There are people of goodwill trying to live a life of meaning, and service to others. Even if the national (indeed, the global) “ethos” seems to be leaning ever more authoritarian, as aging failures (usually white and usually male) strike out at “the other” (often immigrants and invariably not white), and are willing to sacrifice democracy and freedom in the name of their hatreds. Sound familiar?

At the very moment that coalescing and cooperative action will be needed for challenges like, ahem, nuclear proliferation, climate change-for-the-worse), artificial stupidity (which the optimists suggest will kill us all in about three years… or are they just trying to talk up the stock price?), just to name a few… seems ever more out of reach, as parochial hatreds are propped up by the corporate media and, in the American context, “both parties” (by which I mean THE REPUBLICANS, even though Chuck Schumer and the Democrats do everything in their power to keep Republicans viable in the name of political fundraising).

And yet. It’s 25 years later, and many if not most of us are still here, and still not willing to completely give up, let alone lose hope. Indeed, some of us believe that the elections in less than two months time will brush back some of the excesses of the current President, and perhaps there will be serious change in 2028 when the entire Republican apparatus is likely thrown out. Or perhaps we are appropriately immune to this level of pollyannish talk and realize that the hope is in younger people who don’t have the hatreds and bigotries that got us to this point.

As Yogi Berra said, predictions are hard, especially about the future. I don’t know what will happen 25 years from now. I’m 63 now; the actuarial chart says that my making it to 88 is a less than even chance. You all find yourselves wherever you are on the chart. And hey… maybe that AI thing will kill us all, or climate change, or the nukes, or famine or preventable disease (in our present farcical dispensation where our national “health” minister is an anti-science vaccine denier and heroin addict) will finish us off.

I don’t know. This isn’t a day I have looked forward to, nor will it be next year, or the year after, and so forth. But maybe, just maybe… there is some hope for peaceful tomorrows?

Again, read the whole post here.

Vote and work the polls....as if our future depends on it...because it does.

 If you are a U.S. citizen the time to step up is now---(if you have not already done so). Our country needs all of us working on this election. Sitting back and watching is now acceptable.

Trial date set for 9/11 defendants and confession suppressed because of torture

 We are now on the fifth military judge to be hearing these cases relating to the attacks on September 11, 2001. Earlier this week the Judge set a trial date  for June 5, 2028.  

And now today the Judge ruled that a key confession (obtained under torture) cannot be used: 

Judge Excludes Key Confession in Sept. 11 Case

Prosecutors argued the statements by the defendant, Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, were crucial evidence for the eventual death-penalty trial.

By Carol Rosenberg

Aug. 28, 2026 

Updated 12:49 p.m. ET

In a major blow to the U.S. case against Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, the man accused of plotting the Sept. 11 attacks, a military judge ruled on Friday that the prisoner’s confessions to F.B.I. agents were not voluntary and cannot be used against him at trial.

Prosecutors have described Mr. Mohammed’s interrogations in 2007 at the U.S. Navy base in Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, as the government’s most crucial evidence in the long-running death-penalty case.

The ruling, just before the 25th anniversary of the attacks, could further delay the start of a trial if prosecutors decide to appeal to reinstate it. Aging survivors and families of victims have said they worry they may never see a final resolution to the case.

h/o to Walt.

From our friends down under at Justinian

 

How Bad Is Trump, Really?

 

ROGER FITCH ESQ    THURSDAY, AUGUST 6, 2026

 

Crimes at the heart of presidential power ... Shakedowns, extortions, insider trading, cash for pardons, revenge ... And here comes Trump's enabler, Todd Blanche ... Breaking into the backdoor of the Treasury in broad daylight ... Roger Fitch with his Letter from Washington

 

“The founders knew the untamed frontier abounded with bullies. They also knew about felons and cheats … they never imagined a devious, half-literate bully/lawbreaker/cheat could be elected president – not just once, but a second time … following a criminal conviction.” – The Gazette   (Cedar Rapids, Iowa)

 

“Donald Trump” conjures many things: childhood bully; arrested development; ignorant fool; crass real estate developer; known money-launderer; vain sociopath; malignant narcissist; sadistic thug; world’s greatest danger.

 

He’s the most prolific criminal in American political history. In 18 months, he’s violated countless rules/ regulations, laws and constitutional provisions.

 

He’s committed/attempted to commit hundreds of crimes, most with impunity due to the slow machinery of the law and the connivance of a devious chief justice and partisan court majority (now, incredibly, asked to overturn a civil $83m defamation judgment against him). 

 

Even so, as Paul Krugman observes:

 

“His inner self is obviously a bottomless pit of insecurity. He self-medicates by demanding Pyongyang-level flattery, destroying national monuments and replacing them with garish, vulgar trash, persecuting critics and comedians, and starting stupid wars.”

 

“Like a dog marking every tree on the block, Trump is all in on a megalomaniacal project to seed the country with permanent reminders of his squalid rule. We continue to battle back against his list of grotesque vanity projects to disfigure Washington…” – Harry Litman

 

Trump’s corruption is spectacular: he’s stuffed the public service with predatory individuals whose conflicts of interest are helpful to themselves and the Trumps.

 

It’s not just the $800m shakedown of donors, the highly-improper foreign investments of his family, or previously-reported media extortions ($86 million, so far); there’s also Trump’s own crypto-scheme, his pump and dump hustle for his worthless “meme coins“, where Trump gets rich while followers lose billions.

 

There have been stock trades coordinated with announcements of tariffs later ruled illegal, insider trading timed to Iran cease-fires, oil price variations, or government [no-bid] contract awards (e.g, Trump’s purchase of Axon (Taser) shares just before the big ICE contract tailored to Axon).

 

Best of all for the monumentally greedy Trump, there are pardons to sell, without penal consequences in light of the supreme court’s scandalous immunity grant in Trump v US (2024).

 

In dealing with regulatory agencies, now under exclusive Trump control after the supreme court’s end-of-term Slaughter case (more here), corrupt companies are now overtly offering bribes.

 

It’s all apiece with pardons (now including unheard-of “corporate pardons“) that Trump has issued to dozens of unrepentant criminals, wiping out billions in financial penalties (more here), some of which were payable to victims of corporate wrongdoing.

 

One corrupt pardon cost $21.7 million in court-ordered restitution. Trump couldn’t resist helping a casino owner with mob connections; the few million the pardoned man and his wife contributed to Trump’s causes were a sound investment.

 

Most sensationally, Trump pardoned the founders of the cryptocurrency exchange BitMEX, after they pleaded guilty to money-laundering charges, hours before the company (which also pleaded guilty and was “pardoned”), was due to pay a $100 million fine into the US Crime Victims Fund.

 

The compensation vanished along with the guilt.

≈   ≈   ≈

 

His never-ending quest for revenge and personal enrichment aside, Donald Trump seems determined to dismantle American democracy and destroy everything in the US worth saving, e.g, science and scientific data, public health, work safety, food support, American history, the environment, emergency services and energy grants (both denied to Democrat states), medical care, public education (also Harvard), independent journalism, refugee asylum (only white South Africans) and progressive law enforcement.

 

Trump is enabled by a congressional Republican Party described as “a collection of arsonists targeting every part of civil society, liberalism and democracy”, and they’ve been helping Trump, e.g, proposing a watering down of corporate governance, effectively destroying evidence through eliminating the shell company database that’s so useful in attacking kleptocracy.

 

At the same time, Trump is preserving or reinstating everything that is harmful and destructive, primarily through pay-to-play ploys, e.g, inhumane and mercenary immigration detention, turbocharged extractive industries, despoliation of national estate and endangered species; gutting of consumer protection; the deregulation of industrial pollution and, unbelievably, the abrupt loosening of industry-accepted standards of consumer service and product efficiency.

 

It’s all consistent with backhanders to the Gangster-in-Chief, his worthless family and his bottom-circling friends. There seems to be nothing he hasn’t monetised.

≈   ≈   ≈

 

If Donald Trump is evil, he’s found an exceptionally evil lawyer to help him, Acting Attorney General Todd Blanche.

 

Hearings on the confirmation of someone who would surely be the worst attorney general in American history have now been held. He carries heavy baggage, including this 73-page ethics complaint filed in New York State by 101 former federal judges. His confirmation appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee clarified that his first loyalty is to the president and not to justice.

 

It was a bad time to seek Senate confirmation, after the IRS debacle in which Donald Trump thought he had found a way to break into Treasury itself by a back door: the government’s “judgment fund” set up to satisfy settlements of genuine disputes to which the US government is a party.

 

Trump’s aim was to improperly tap (and not for the first time) a fund set aside for genuine settlements by DoJ. This clearly excluded the “slush fund” for January 6 rioters who were not even parties, and in the case of Trump v IRS, the sham suit did not involve adverse party litigation.

 

Last of all was Trump’s effort to gain an IRS get-out-of-audit card, an agreement which is foreclosed by a specific statute forbidding such agreements, more here.

 

The fact that the judgment fund is not available to settle matters not in dispute; that the actions in question have been barred by statutes of limitations, as well as specific statutes against presidents interfering in IRS audits; the fact that leaking tax information is limited to statutory damages of $1000 per person per leak, and that in any event, court decisions establish that there is no IRS responsibility for contractor actions; nay, the fact that it is specifically unlawful to pay insurgents; none of this is being talked about,

 

Meanwhile, in an important district court decision, DC Judge Kathleen M. Williams specifically found the IRS “settlement” improper and sanctioned the lawyers involved, including Acting AG Blanche; the entire January 6 “slush fund” was nullified.

 

Harry Litman and Dean Erwin Chemerinsky have more.

 

Even so, the servile Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee who voted to advance Blanche’s AG nomination ignored Judge Williams’ decision, apparently unconcerned by the still-subsisting and stunningly corrupt sweetheart deal (see settlement agreement here) Blanche concocted with the IRS.

 

The agreement could save Donald Trump $100 million in back taxes and penalties.

 

 

Lindsay also worked hard to keep Guantanamo open...

 

Good riddance to Lindsay Graham. He worked hard to keep Guantanamo open and although there are a lot of others who help (Yes, You too Obama) I think it is fair to say that Lindsay played an important role. So yes, good riddance to you Mr. Graham. 

This is just an excerpt from a longer article well worth reading. Link to the full article at the bottom.

By the spring of 2009, Republican opposition to closing Guantanamo and Democratic timidity in the face of that opposition coalesced into an early wedge issue against Obama on Capitol Hill. Here was a way to portray the then-politically potent Obama as dangerously unconcerned with "national security" without affirmatively opposing the end of the politically toxic Iraq War. (Graham, consistent here at least, had no problem affirmatively opposing withdrawal from Iraq.) Graham didn't join in. Instead, Graham spent the better part of a year working on a plan with White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel to deliver the closure of the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay—but that plan depended on jettisoning the vast majority of what had made Guantanamo objectionable and internationally infamous.

Throughout 2009 and into 2010, Emanuel and Graham worked on something that represented a grand bipartisan bargain on terrorism detentions. First Graham worked with Michigan Democrat Carl Levin to pass into law the Military Commissions Act of 2009, reviving a system for nonjudicial military tribunals that the Supreme Court had struck down in 2006. Obama signed it into law. While Graham and Levin worked on it, granting the accused more procedural rights than in the pre-2006 version, Obama laid the rhetorical groundwork for it in an important speech at the National Archives that May. In that speech, Obama not only defended the concept of military commissions, he embraced indefinite detention. He treated indefinite detention as the "toughest single issue" related to terrorism detentions, meaning it as a regrettable embrace of a wicked problem that he inherited from Bush. (And in the process, Obama soft-pedaled the reason for keeping some Guantanamo detainees as forever-prisoners: they had been tortured so severely as to compromise any hope of a credible trial, even in a military commission.) 

What Obama described as an exception, Graham, with Emanuel, sought to make the new status quo. While no one should go easy on Obama for conceding the legitimacy of indefinite detention without trial in any case, he was talking about the disposition of existing cohorts of Guantanamo detainees who had experienced extensive torture. Graham, by contrast, was trying to build a system of indefinite military detention as a solution for future captives, including from the distant battlefields of Iraq and Afghanistan. In exchange, Graham promised to find the Republican votes in the Senate for closing Guantanamo. To Emanuel, it represented an early win for Obama on a campaign promise cherished in particular by the left. 

Link to the full article here.

Hope dies last...

 

Let it begin again

 In Congress, July 4, 1776

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America, When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

let's not let this be our new national anthem (oops)

 

JUSTICE U.S. STYLE

                 

By Carol Rosenberg

Prosecutors portrayed the prisoners as unrepentant jihadists who bragged about their roles in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks to federal agents during their first months in military detention at Guantánamo Bay.

Defense lawyers cast the men as so broken by violence and solitary confinement in their years in C.I.A. prisons overseas that they were groomed to involuntarily confess to U.S. agents.

Over eight days this month, the two sides offered these stark, clashing views to a military judge who is now confronted with the overarching question in the long-running capital case: Did Khalid Shaikh Mohammed, who is accused of hatching and organizing the Sept. 11 attacks, and two co-defendants voluntarily incriminate themselves to F.B.I. agents years ago, and can their statements be used against them?

The case is in its 15th year of these pretrial proceedings, and no date has been set for the trial to begin. But the judge’s decision could be a turning point almost 25 years after the attacks killed nearly 3,000 people in New York, Pennsylvania and at the Pentagon.

Read more here.