“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.
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Katrina vanden Heuvel: Antonin Scalia: Torture’s Not Torture Unless He Says It Is
Perhaps, as Justice Scalia told a Swiss university audience earlier this month, it is indeed “very facile” for Americans to declare that “torture is terrible.” The justice posited to his listeners a classic ticking-time-bomb scenario-this one involving “a person that you know for sure knows the location of a nuclear bomb that has been planted in Los Angeles and will kill millions of people”-and asked, “You think it’s clear that you cannot use extreme measures to get that information out of that person?” Now, I didn’t see that episode of 24, but I have read my Bill of Rights, and I’m far more inclined to align myself here with James Madison than with Jack Bauer-or with Antonin Scalia.
Psychopaths, sadists, and Scalia notwithstanding, no one really asks the asinine question, “Is torture terrible?” because it’s already been answered. Torture, George Washington told his troops in 1775, brings “shame, disgrace, and ruin” to the country; earlier this month, Sen. John McCain called the CIA’s enhanced interrogation tactics “shameful and unnecessary” and decried their employment. The UN expressly banned torture in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948 and twice underlined the position in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (adopted in 1966) and Convention Against Torture (adopted in 1984). Common Article 3 to the Geneva Conventions (1949) prohibits “violence of life and person, in particular murder of all kinds, mutilation, cruel treatment and torture,” as well as “outrages upon personal dignity, in particular humiliating and degrading treatment.” Finally, torture is illegal in the United States under federal law. [..]
It is a travesty that we must countenance a Supreme Court justice who holds such contempt for both domestic and international law-and for human dignity and decency as well. There is no justice in torture, and we cannot tolerate a justice who is for torture.
Zoë Carpenter: White House Threatens to Veto Keystone XL Legislation
President Obama will not sign legislation to approve the Keystone XL pipeline, the White House said Tuesday. The veto threat came as Republicans assumed the majority in both chambers of Congress, having promised to make green-lighting the tar sands project their first priority.
“There is already a well-established process in place to consider whether or not infrastructure project like this are in the best interest of the country,” White House press secretary Josh Earnest told reporters.
The veto threat isn’t altogether surprising. The White House has said repeatedly that the president is committed to the review pending in the State Department, which is held up by an ongoing court case in Nebraska. Obama has also spoken skeptically in recent weeks about claims that the project would spur economic growth and contribute to domestic energy security. [..]
Obama’s commitment to the review process means we can expect the drama to carry on at least until the Nebraska Supreme Court case is decided. And even if Obama vetoes Congress’ KXL bill on the grounds that it undercuts his authority, it’s possible that he would approve the project itself later on. Activists are continuing to demonstrate against the pipeline this week, aware that the fight is very much still on.
Too many police leaders and politicians have responded to the recent tragic double murder of Officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos by blaming Barack Obama, Bill de Blasio, and peaceful police brutality protestors. At the same time, they refuse to acknowledge, let alone condemn, the police violence and brutality that have claimed the lives of countless people, including Eric Garner and Michael Brown.
This New Year’s, a good resolution for these professional pugilists would be to learn from the very families who have lost their loved ones to police brutality. The families of Michael Brown and, Eric Garner, in particular, would be good to study. While grieving their own losses, they have been able to extend condolences and sympathy to the grieving families of officers Lui and Ramos. And they have condemned violence in any form. [..]
The double police murder of December 20 requires no fancy detective work to get to the obvious facts. Ismaaiyl Brinsley wasn’t from New York, wasn’t part of the Black Lives Matter movement (anti-violent from the start), had shot his girlfriend earlier in the day, and had a history of mental illness which included suicide attempts.
Winonah Hauter: For the Planet and Future Generations, New Congress May Be Most Dangerous Yet
The swearing-in of the 114th Congress this week spells trouble for our food, water and environment, and for all those who seek to champion healthy, safe communities for our families. We may be looking at the most hostile Congress ever in terms of protecting the environment.
Here are a few examples of what we could face over the next few years:
James Inhofe (R-Okla.), a notorious climate change denier and an unabashed champion for the fossil fuel industry, will likely chair the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee. Expect the committee to intensify its bullying of environmentalists, especially in light of the game-changing decision by New York Governor Andrew Cuomo to ban fracking.
We’ll also see attacks on the credibility of groups that do environmental work – in fact, we already have, and it will only get worse.
Lauren Carlsen: Obama Has Nothing to Gain by Propping Up Mexico’s Government
Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto is traveling to Washington, seeking to bolster his support in the United States as it rapidly unravels in his own country. But President Barack Obama has much to lose by propping up the faltering Mexican leader. [..]
If Obama gives Peña Nieto the expected pat on the back, it will be a stab in the back to the Mexican movement for justice and transparency. Obama and Congress should instead announce their full support for a thorough investigation of the disappearances and the suspension of all police and military aid to Mexico. Congress must also immediately stop funding Plan Mexico – the drug war aid package formally known as the Merida Initiative that has appropriated about $2.4 billion to Mexico – and look closely and responsibly at what U.S. aid to Mexican security forces is actually supporting: namely, human rights abuses.
Our government should respect our own stated principles and laws on human rights and democracy, as well as Mexicans’ efforts to save their nation from the abyss into which it’s fallen.
President Obama must no longer lend U.S. political and economic support to an authoritarian system in crisis.
Nozomi Hayase: The Battle of Our Time: Breaking the Spell of the Corporate State
In late 2010, political activist John Perry Barlow tweeted: “The first serious info-war is now engaged. The field of battle is WikiLeaks. You are the troops.” In the last four years, new insurgencies have arisen from cyberspace to participate in the battle against government corruption and secrecy. From Snowden’s disclosure of NSA mass surveillance to the release of the CIA torture report evidencing war crimes and murder of innocent people, a crisis of legitimacy and moral depravity of authority are becoming increasingly undeniable. All of this reveals an invisible force of governance working to control the thought and perceptions of the greater population for nefarious ends.
In his 2006 seminal writing “Conspiracy as Governance,” WikiLeaks editor Julian Assange noted how the secrecy regime works as “a system of interacting organs, a beast with arteries and veins whose blood may be thickened and slowed until it falls…” As was seen in the recent secret economic treaties like TPP and TISA exposed by WikiLeaks, systems of national governance have evolved into a global network that undermines the sovereignty of countries and the rights of people and puts corporate profit above all else.
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