Raid on Geneva

Go read Marty Lederman today on the administration's machinations regarding the Geneva Convention (especially Common Article 3). Then sing out from the hills far and wide so that this end-around assault on the Convention gets the negative publicity it deserves. The US is not above the law, whether legal or moral.

Well, as I suggested, the Administration's noises about how, in the wake of Hamdan, it was finally going to comply with Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions, are not quite what they were cracked up to be in the eager, early press releases.

Today we discover that "[a] day after saying that terror suspects had a right to protections under the Geneva Conventions, the Bush administration said Wednesday that it wanted Congress to pass legislation that would limit the rights granted to detainees. The earlier statement had been widely interpreted as a retreat, but testimony to Congress by administration lawyers on Wednesday made clear that the picture was more complicated."

Ah, yes. "The picture is more complicated." Here's the "complication": The Administration is asking Congress for statutory authorization for the United States to violate Common Article 3. That's what Lindsey Graham means when he says "that Common Article Three must be 'reined in.'"...