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October 01, 2004

Comments

Not sure whether to be pleased or horrified to see you back, Katherine, but this is another humdinger of a post. Hope it gets as much attention as the last.

it's just until the vote Thursday. (I think)

There is nothing about me --- no opinion, no values, no thought, no feeling, no policy --- that is represented by the so-called representative in my district: Tom Tancredo.

But I'll make a call.

Thanks for bringing this issue to light. Do keep us apprised of how this bill proceeds.

The WSJ's account contradicts the Post's account, at least on the point of whether the Justice Department supports the provision. It won't let me link, but the exact text from their Sept 30 article is "One of the things the House bill would do is deny immigrants certain court appeals, including banning court reviews of claims that an illegal immigrant would be tortured upon return to his or her home country. American Civil Liberties Union lawyer Timothy Edgar called that part of "the enactment of a hard-line anti-immigrant policy."

The Bush administration opposes that provision, Justice Department spokesman Mark Corello said Thursday."

Message sent. Let's hope it takes.

Sent a message to both my Congress guys, the one at home and the one at college. Hope it does the job.

There's a rogue bold tag somewhere in that post. I propose the UN send in inspectors to locate it.

McDuff--no, no, no, in this age of terror we must hunt down rogue html tags unilaterally.

(I think I got rid of it.)

If you kill one rogue html tag, you'll only make it a martyr and six others will spring up to replace it!

I called my representative, Pete Hoekstra, but since he is one of the co-sponsors of the bill there's not much chance he'll do anything.

Since he's a member of the Reformed Church in America I have downloaded their last Synod's position paper on torture. While the Synod did not accept the paper of their Committee on Christian Action on security and torture I still intend to call their office and ask about their views on one of their members advocating it. The paper shows the church is thinking about it.

If you kill one rogue html tag, you'll only make it a martyr and six others will spring up to replace it!

Stay the course, McDuff. Stay the course.

Markey's bill is HR4674 — you'll want to correct your cut-and-paste "write your congressman" letter in 5. above, which has transposed digits.

Information on the bill can be found here, including the list of co-sponsors, which now numbers 23.

Thanks.

The Thomas query links die in a few hours, but I corrected the post.

The new co-sponsor is Representative Susan A. Davis, a Democrat from California's 53rd, who joined on September 30. Congratulations and thanks to any constituents who wrote to her.

George, thanks for the Wall St. Journal excerpt. I guess when Justice Department spokesman Mark Corallo says "We can't comment on any specific provision" he means "we won't comment on any specific provision to the Washington Post."

It's vital that Republican Congressional reps hear from their constituents opposing _all_ the provisions that were not recommended by the September 1 Commission, but especially the one legalizing rendition to torturing states. Cite the commissioners' statements in the Post article in your messages.

A New York Times editorial on the subject alludes to White House expressions of support for the (cleaner) Senate version, but I haven't seen anything of the kind (cites welcome!).

I have a hard time believing that Tom DeLay and Dennis Hastert are sticking all these provisions in against the will of the administration. Their determination to hold fast this coming week speaks volumes about the real intent of the Bush admin here. As with everything else, they want to use the Sept. 11 reforms as a political club: load the bill with garbage and defy Democrats to oppose it.

This is why it's also vital to communicate with Senators about keeping the Senate bill free of garbage amendments during markup and passage, and during reconciliation with the House version.

Letters to the editor to big papers in your state, and to their editorial boards, can also help put pressure on Senators. I'd think Republican Senators facing strong election challenges would be especially vulnerable: "Challenger A wants to carry out the Sept. 11 Commission's recommendations. Sen. Z supports dangerous, unnecessary provisions that the Commisioners oppose."

Katherine, Britian's Channel 4 is now reporting on your having broken this story

http://www.channel4.com/news/2004/10/week_1/01_blog.html

Keep up the great work!

e

Message Sent; spreading the word! Keep it up.

Thanks for all your efforts to bring this horrendous
bill to light and for alerting people to make use of their right and obligation to call their Congress Reps and Senators to oppose HR 10. The administration does not want call torture by its name so ABUSE and RENDITION
seem to be the "IN" words. There can be no other word for torture. TORTURE is a crime.

Alice

Volunteer at the TORTURE ABOLITION and SURVIVORS SUPPORT
COALITION

This cosmic buddha dude--haven't clicked of course--has been responsible for a lot of the comment spams popping up in the last week. He or she is using a lot of different handles with legit-seeming homepages, and always link to the anthony.iacello site. Whatever that is.

I've noticed that a lot of the comment spam arrives at heavily trackbacked sites. If closing all old threads is a pain, maybe you could prioritize the trackbacked ones.

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