Published since 2005. San Francisco is a city that belongs to the people of the world. Hence this blog has a global focus. The name "Sam Spade's San Francisco" refers to an exciting era in the City's history, the time of Dashiell Hammett's fictional gumshoe and San Francisco character, Sam Spade. My name is Tom Dunn and I edit the blog. I'm not as exciting as Sam Spade, but I am definitely a San Francisco character.Contact or on Twitter -- Search blog below.
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Friday, February 23, 2007
Fix the Military Commissions Act
Countless Americans like us were shocked when Congress passed and the President Bush signed the Military Commissions Act (MCA).
When they did, they cast aside the Constitution and the centuries-old principle of habeas corpus, which protects against unlawful and indefinite imprisonment. The MCA also gave the president the power to decide by himself who is and who is not an enemy, and to strip individuals of their right to due process under the law.
Now, an excellent bill to fix these problems is about to be proposed, but we need Congress to hear from us to make passing it a priority. Fix the Military Commissions Act
The Un-American Military Commissions Act needs to be fixed because it:
* Allows the president alone to decide who is and who is not an enemy of this country.
* Eliminates the Constitution’s due process right to habeas corpus for people the president decides are enemies of our country, and permits the government to keep hundreds of detainees imprisoned indefinitely and without charge.
* Lets the president make up his own rules on what is torture and abuse, instead of simply following the rules in the Geneva Conventions; and
* Removes accountability for top government officials, which means that we can’t know that torture and abuse has stopped and won’t happen again.
S. 576, the Restoring the Constitution Act of 2007, fixes these problems by stopping the president from designating anyone he wants as an enemy combatant, and instead defines enemy combatants as those people who are actually fighting against us.
Urge Senators Feinstein and Boxer to cosponsor the "Restoring the Constitution Act of 2007," and to restore American vales by fixing the Un-American Military Commissions Act.
The bill would make clear that the federal government must comply with the Geneva Conventions, and that no one in the federal government can make up their own rules on the use of torture and abuse. Not an army private in the field. Not a top official sitting in a cushy office in Washington. Not even the president.
It restores habeas corpus and due process by:
* Stopping the President from deciding on his own who is an enemy of the country and then taking away the person’s habeas corpus due process right against unlawful imprisonment. The new bill would limit enemy combatants to people actually fighting our country, and not innocent people snatched from streets far from any battlefield. For those detainees being held at Guantanamo Bay and elsewhere, it restores the Constitution’s habeas corpus protection of having a court decide whether a person is being imprisoned unlawfully.
* Blocking the federal government from making up its own rules on torture and abuse. The Geneva Conventions have been the law for decades on how we behave during war. The new bill makes clear that the federal government must comply with the Geneva Conventions, and no one in the federal government -- not even the president -- can make up their own rules on the use of torture and abuse.
* Making sure that there aren’t two different standards -- one for privates and sergeants and the other for top government officials. When Congress passed the Military Commissions Act, it left men and women in the military subject to comprehensive laws against torture and abuse, but gave top government officials a get-out-of-jail free card. The new bill makes sure that all felony torture and abuse can be prosecuted, even if the perpetrator is sitting in a cushy office in Washington instead of serving as a private in the field.
When the Military Commissions Act was signed into law in October, many Americans realized that the only thing scarier than a government that would take away our basic freedoms is a Congress and a people that would let it happen. We need to let Congress know that it is time to correct the October mistake and restore habeas corpus and due process in America, stop the president from deciding on his own who is an enemy of our country, and make sure that we all follow the same set of rules.
Urge Senators Feinstein and Boxer to co-sponsor the Restoring the Constitution Act of 2007, and to restore American vales by fixing the Un-American Military Commissions Act. To send a pre-written letter to Senators Feinstein and Boxer through the ACLU website, click here.
Senator Diane Feinstein
Senator Barbara Boxer
For more information read "Cleaning Up Washington" by Senator Barack Obama here.
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