AN OPEN LETTER TO DEMOCRATS: HABEAS CORPUS... ITS BIGGER THAN YOUR CAREER PATH

In the midst of the midterm elections, Congressman Sherrod Brown went from being my favorite Senate candidate to the only one I had to kick off the Blue America page and urge our members to stop donating money to. That's because Sherrod Brown played some disgraceful political calculus that allowed him to vote for Bush's torture bill, a bill that also negates hundreds of years of Anglo-American law by jeopardizing habeas corpus. Americans should have risen up en masse and thrown Bush out of the White House he was never elected to.

Matt Stoller informed me today that Democrats are doing the ole calculus routine again, trying to figure out whether or not to restore it. Playing defense, as usual, they are worried that restoring basic rights to Americans will make them look weak. They make me sick.

I'm told there's an outside shot that House Democrats on the Armed Services Committee will put a restoration of habeas corpus into the Defense Department Authorization Bill being marked up tomorrow and Thursday. Apparently Chairman Skelton has the votes but there are concerns about whether to have this fight now.

Now's the time to let them know that this is something that we elected them to get done. There's a bit of fear that this vote could put freshmen members at risk, though I don't really know why as the data on this isn't compelling and the attack ads just didn't work in 2006.

The most important members to contact are Ike Skelton, antiwar freshmen, and members of the Armed Services Committee. Pelosi and Hoyer would be good too. Each link below goes to that member's email form, and their phone numbers are to the right. I've only included Democratic members of the committee since the decision on whether to make a vote will be made within the party -- the full list of Armed Service members is here.

The key is to ask them to restore habeas corpus and to let them know how crucial an issue it is to you. There are 4 members of the committee who were endorsed by Blue America, Patrick Murphy, Carol Shea-Porter, Kirsten Gillibrand and Joe Sestak. Last year 584 of us donated to Congresswoman Gillibrand through Blue America and 674 of us did likewise with Congressman Murphy and 815 with Congressman Sestak. This year Patrick Murphy is on our list again, Congressman Sestak has requested that he come over for a Blue America chat on June 2, and we added Carol Shea Porter and showed her a whole lotta love.

You want to be part of the solution? I have a better way than sitting around sticking pins into Dick Cheney dolls. Contact Patrick Murphy, Joe Sestak, Kirsten Gillibrand and Carol Shea-Porter and introduce yourself. Tell them you were proud to help them get into Congress and that you're eager to help them again next year... and that habeas corpus isn't something to play political games with. The hearings are Thursday.


NEW YORK TIMES TO DEMOCRATS: GIVE US BACK OUR HABEAS CORPUS

Today's NY Times most important editorial is a reminder to Democrats that they have a job to do. Cleaning up after Bush will take years. Restoring habeas corpus is an excellent, a crucial, first step.

Last year, Congressional Democrats allowed the Bush administration to ram through one of the worst laws in the nation’s history-- the Military Commissions Act of 2006. This year, the Democrats pledged to use their new majority to begin repairing the profound damage the law has done to the nation’s justice system and global image.

But there are disturbing signs their pledge may fall victim to the same tactical political calculations and Bush administration propagandizing that allowed this scandalous law to pass in the first place.

Pointing to the heart of the Bush Regime's Rovian modus operandi, the Times editors remind us the congressional Democrats that "Bush turned habeas corpus into a partisan issue by declaring that the prisoners in Guantánamo Bay, even innocent ones, do not deserve a hearing. Lawmakers who objected were painted as friends of terrorists."

But let’s be clear. There is nothing “conservative” or “tough on terrorism” in selectively stripping people of their rights. Suspending habeas corpus is an extreme notion on the radical fringes of democratic philosophy. As four retired military chief prosecutors-- from the Navy, the Marines and the Army-- pointed out to Congress, holding prisoners without access to courts merely feeds Al Qaeda’s propaganda machine, increases the risk to the American military and sets a precedent by which other governments could justify detaining American civilians without charges or appeal.

Consider some of the other wild-eyed liberals calling on Congress to restore habeas corpus: William Sessions, director of the F.B.I. under the first President Bush; David Keene, head of the American Conservative Union; the National Association of Evangelicals; David Neff, editor of Christianity Today, founded by the Rev. Billy Graham; a long list of other evangelical leaders and scholars; and nearly two dozen sitting and retired federal judges...

The Democratic majority has a long list of wrongs to right from six years of Mr. Bush’s leadership. We are sympathetic to their concerns about finding a way to revive habeas corpus that won’t die in committee or be subject to a presidential veto of a larger bill. But lawmakers sometimes have to stand on principle and trust the voters to understand.

This is one of those times.