When fighting the War on Terror or any war, there are always the conflicting priorities of individual liberties and the effective execution of the war. It seems that the trimming of the edges of civil liberties during the current conflict has been at best reasonable and at worst fairly minor excursions given the way wars have been executed in the past.
Some Democrats are bent out of shape at the interception of electronic communications between elements of Al Qaeda on foreign soil with Americans in the absence of warrant. The Administration has backed off a probably legal tactic, but what ever civil liberties might have been broached are small compared to World War II when all international communications were subject to warrantless interception.
Others are bothered at to the disposition of detainees at Guantanamo Bay. Are they prisoners of war? If they are, then they can be held to the end of the War on Terror, which may be indefinitely. If they are tried in criminal courts and they are prisoners of war, it violates the Geneva Convention. The issue of illegal combatants is complicated, but perhaps the detainees can best labeled as “pirates” under international law. Whatever one thinks about this issue, its consequences are small compared to thousands of Japanese Americans detained during World War II.
While much press attention and public argument have been devoted to statistically rare and extreme civil liberties questions, glaring civil liberties issues that can effect thousands if not millions are largely ignored. Recently, the Supreme Court has allowed to circumscription of First Amendment in the vicinity of abortion clinics and an expansive view of the states’ right to eminent domain.
Add to this list of assault on civil liberties, the recent law passed by the House of Representatives on a largely party-line vote. The bill is a payback by the Democratic Party for aggressive union support. Under current law, parties can request secret ballots for workers voting to organize a union. The new Democratic bill eliminates the right to a secret ballot, making workers subject to union intimidation. Since it is the unions who are pushing for this provision, it is clear that they are convinced that in many case workers left to the free choice would reject union advances.
Unions may be frustrated in their declining membership in the face of a massive switch from a manufacturing to a service-based economy. However, this is not sufficient reason to violate the cherished principle of a secret ballot.
Now labor supporters argue that companies can intimidate workers so the unions need this advantage to counter act company activities. The argument is self-refuting considering that an open ballot would make workers more subject to company intimidation. The whole idea behind the secret ballot was to originally protect workers from company retaliation. As a general rule, whoever wishes to eliminate the secret ballot is the party that hopes to gain by intimidation. It this case, it is the unions.
The bill will likely not survive the Senate, where a filibuster will probably kill the bill before it even comes to a vote. Even if it were to pass the Senate, President Bush would exercise a rare veto. In a sense, this a free vote for Democrats, they can payback unions, without actually being responsible for a bill that undermines democratic (this time certainly with a small “d”) principles. The cynicism makes Democratic protests about civil liberties in other contexts suspect.
Guilty of Perjury
Saturday, March 10th, 2007There is great irony in the fact the Scooter Libby was convicted for lying to a grand jury about who he informed about the truth that Valerie Plame worked for the CIA and was responsible for suggesting that her husband Ambassador Joseph Wilson be sent on a fact-finding mission to Africa. On the other hand Joseph Wilson and his wife are enjoying book royalties, possible compensation for a movie story, and puff pieces in Vanity Fair, when virtually everyone of Wilson’s claims were certified as false by the 9/11 Commission Report. Indeed, the Washington Post concedes that one outcome of the entire affair is that “[t]he former ambassador will be remembered as a blowhard.”
There are at least two important lessons from this episode. Lessons that politicians appeared destined to be continually re-learn.
The first lesson from this political tragedy is that one never ever lies under oath. It does not matter whether or not there is a substantive underlying issue in question, perjury and obstruction of justice can and generally ought to be prosecuted. This mistake was largely responsible for the fall of President Richard Nixon and resulted in the impeachment of President Clinton.
When the Valerie Plame story broke, many wondered whether the release of Valerie Plame’s name violated the 1982 Intelligence Identities Protection Act. It turns out that under the provisions of the act Plame did not qualify for protection. This interpretation is given tremendous weight by the fact that Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald did not even charge anyone with this crime, though many have since admitted that the spoke of Plame’s CIA position. Indeed, the original source of the leak which appeared in an article by Bob Novak was Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage. The original claim by Administration critics is that Valerie Plame’s name was released by the Administration as retribution against her husband. Actually, Armitage was no fan of the Iraq War. He released Plame’s name in passing as a way to explain how some as conspicuously indiscreet as Wilson would be sent on a sensitive mission to Niger. Despite Wilson’s initial denials, he was sent on his because his wife suggested his name to the CIA.
The second lesson is that decisions to appoint special counsels are almost invariably mistakes. Ordinary prosecutors are faced with finite resources and many potential crimes to investigate. They are consequently compelled to prioritize: to choose those crimes that are deserve government resources. They are forced to weigh the public benefit to the prosecutions against the costs. Special counsels, by definition, have a narrow focus and unlimited resources. This situation usually devolves to trail distorted decisions.
Even before Fitzgerald became the special counsel the Justice Department knew that Armitage had given Plame’s name to Novak. Fitzpatrick’s next step should have been to determine whether that revelation violated the law. Any reasonable reading of the relevant law would have concluded that no law was broken. Indeed, no one was ever charged with a crime from revealing the Plame’s name. The special counsel’s office could reasonably have closed up shop within months or weeks.
Instead, given a blank check for further investigation, Fitzgerald trolled for perjury by conducting grand jury hearings. This does not excuse perjury or obstruction of justice on the part of Libby or anyone else, but is does reveal the injustice of unconstrained and unaccountable prosecutions. Indeed, on the jurors, Ann Redington, while driven by the compelling logic of the law to convict Libby concludes that justice would be served by pardoning Libby.
This is a particularly sorry episode, of using the criminal justice system to adjudicate political disputes and on that , in the words of the Washington Post, “besmirched nearly everyone it touched.”
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